


Keep the Drama on the Stage

by Moonwisher



Category: Assassination Classroom
Genre: Acting, Alternate Universe - Normal High School, Angst, Background Maehara/Isogai, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fluff, Human! Korosensei, M/M, Minor Violence, Nagisa POV, No Spoilers, Romance, Sassy! Nagisa, School Play, Slow Build, Theatre, slightly OOC
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-14
Updated: 2017-07-22
Packaged: 2018-08-08 18:29:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 38,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7768549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonwisher/pseuds/Moonwisher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sadistic transfer student. Crazy drama teacher. Even crazier school play. Nagisa didn’t think that this new school year could get any worse…</p><p>Two enemies are forced together by the dreaded annual school play; will they still hate each other by the end, or will they learn to accept each other? One thing’s for sure: this school year is gonna be one heck of a ride...</p><p>*Currently on Hiatus, Sorry!*</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Amber Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! So this is my first ever fanfic :o Most of this story is going to be from Nagisa's POV, but I might change my mind later. I would really appreciate any kind of feedback - anything like what you liked, ideas for the rest of the story, and even constructive criticism. Anyways, without further ado let's dive straight into this fic!

Oh crap! My pace sped up as I felt fat rain droplets slowly begin to trickle down my face, before the heavens opened and a torrential downpour cascaded down, successfully drenching me within minutes as I ran down the pavement seeking shelter - typical, this had to happen on the one day I forgot my umbrella. 

As if from nowhere, a motorbike raced down the flooded street and straight into a puddle right next to me, further soaking me in water without an apology or even a second glance; what the hell? I wiped my dripping hair from my face and death-stared the motorbike’s retreating form with anger bubbling in my chest, focusing all of my attention on that heartless biker’s back and their stupid studded jacket. Isn’t that a road hazard? What's the point of even having a motorcycle jacket to protect you if you would get impaled by it anyway if you fell off?

As my thoughts were occupied by the biker and their questionable attire, I paid no attention to where I was walking, or anything around me for that matter. Suddenly, my face erupted in pain and I felt a nauseating falling sensation, followed by more pain spreading across my whole body as my back hit the ground with a sickening crack. My mind was blank as I attempted to process what had just happened.

After a moment of lying on the ground completely still, I finally opened my eyes and attempted to sit up, but that only resulted in my vision swimming and black spots appearing across my eyesight - luckily, that only lasted a few seconds before my vision cleared and the queasy feeling in my stomach left. Only then did I feel something sticky trickling down my face, and I lifted my hand up to my face to see what it was, before flinching in pain as my fingers brushed my nose. Great. 

As I glanced up to see what I had crashed into, my heart clenched in embarrassment as I saw what was in front of me: a lamppost. Of course. Only the great Nagisa Shiota could perform such a stunt (and in public as well!), but thankfully the Gods were on my side today as no one was on the streets to see what had just transpired. Despite my throbbing body I felt blessed that the streets were deserted, so as a symbol of my appreciation, I raised my arms to the sky and threw back my head in silent thanks to whatever higher power had sprinkled me in their good fortune.

I was just about to get up from my ridiculous position on the ground, before I heard a kind of clicking sound echo behind me. It sort of sounded like… a camera… oh. Please no. I slowly turned my head around, dreading what was behind me. It could have been anything right? No need to worry...right? My head finally stopped turning as my eyes met with a sight that made me want to curl into a ball and die. 

It was a person. He was holding a phone in his right hand, while his left one clutched an umbrella above his head. I felt his eyes bore into mine but I refused to meet his gaze, too mortified to move. The figure in front of me quickly crouched down to my level so that I didn’t get a chance to look away, and his amber eyes clashed with my cobalt blue ones; a smirk was also evident on his face, and at that moment I knew that he had seen everything. While I was sitting there still paralysed with shock, I vaguely registered that, although this boy was around the same age as me, I had never actually seen him before - I guess that was a small blessing, considering that there were many worse people that could have witnessed my little performance.

After a minute of just staring at each other, I began to feel slightly uneasy, as the rain continued to pour down and I was getting more and more soaked. A shiver ran up my spine, and I knew that I needed to get out of this rain as soon as possible to avoid being ill for school next week. Urgh, the thought of school immediately put me in a bad mood and even succeeded in pulling me out of the weird trance I seemed to be in.

I broke eye contact with the still-grinning boy in front of me and stood up, my body aching in protest - I couldn’t be 100% sure, but I knew that I had at least not broken any bones, probably just gained some impressive bruises. Even after I had stood up and brushed myself off (little good that did but whatever), those amber orbs still refused to look away from me. I half-expected him to just stay like that, or even offer me a space under his umbrella. However, he just clicked his tongue and turned around to walk away from me. What a jerk! 

I just let a ‘tch’ sound and stomped away back home, not even trying to hurry now that I was practically dripping with water anyway. Who did that guy think he was? He must be some kind of sick sadist to take photos of poor helpless people on the streets who have just been through a traumatic and embarrassing experience. Okay, maybe I was being a little too dramatic, but this guy could have just been a decent human being and been a little more courteous - he could have helped me up, or even just have the common decency to  _ not _ look as if he was enjoying my awkwardness and humiliation. 

I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. Who cares anyway? I’d never even seen this guy before, and there was no point in getting mad at some random stranger that I’ll never even see again. I then blocked him and his stupid smirk from my mind, and continued to splash my way home.

_ The Next Week... _

I had been dreading this day ever since the last school year ended: the first day back at school. Not only was I in a bad mood, but I was also completely alone. I hadn’t even seen any of my friends yet, which is probably a bonus for them as at least they won’t catch my gross disease - but I hadn’t seen them in weeks and yes, I admit that I have been bored and lonely without them. Unfortunately, I knew that none of them were very punctual (especially on the first Monday back at school), and since I had arrived early today, I knew that I was probably going to be alone until at least the first lesson. I let out a sigh, but didn’t allow myself to wallow in my self-pity for too long. Oh well, I have nothing better to do now than head to class and hope that I won’t be the only one there. 

At the start of every new school year, each class met before lessons in an assigned classroom, which was usually the same every year; for our class, we were assigned some random classroom next to the cafeteria that wasn’t actually used for any lessons. It was quite a small and damp room, but no one really cared when it came to our class, as we had quite a bad rep in the school. Gosh, what’s gotten into me recently? I’ve seriously been so brooding and pessimistic, it’s not like me at all. Come to think of it, these abnormal mood swings only began after I met… No. It doesn’t matter anymore, I just need to forget about that whole fiasco. 

I nodded my head determinedly, and began to stride confidently to my classroom with a newly-found resolve. On my way there, a few other students turned my way and gave me strange looks, but I was unfazed and in high-spirits so I gave them a cheerful wave and carried on striding to my destination. Nothing can get me down! I am a new and improved man, with the willpower to succeed this year! I can do anything! Scoff all you want, but I will be the best, I will–

As I turned the corner and entered my dingy assigned classroom, my feet ground to a halt and my cheerful smile immediately froze on my face. Hell no. I must be dreaming. This cannot possibly be real. I slowly blinked and even rubbed my eyes for good measure, but as soon as I reopened them, my jaw opened in sheer disbelief at what was waiting for me in the classroom. Those eyes. They were the ones that I had tried so hard to eject from my memory.

“ _ You… _ ” I whispered, as my eyes narrowed at the figure perched on top of my desk, looking as if he owned the place. His eyes lit up as they turned to meet my fierce gaze, before he looked around the classroom and then pointed at himself in mock confusion, one eyebrow raised. A scowl never left my face, I really wasn’t in the mood for joking around; my mood had gone from 100 to 0 very quickly. “You’re sitting on my desk,” I practically spat at him, but he didn’t make any indication that he would be moving anytime soon; instead, a grin spread across his face and he just sat like that, watching me from his perch.

“Oh, how rude of me,” he purred, “I haven’t introduced myself.” I really couldn't be bothered to deal with this right now so I just gave him a withering glance and sat down by the desk farthest from my usual one - but I guess it’s his now, I warily admitted. My patience began to wear extremely thin as I heard the boy start to tap his foot on my ex-desk, but what really pissed me off was when he began to hum along to the tune of Mickey by Toni Basil. Oh god, why did I have to be stuck in a classroom with this guy?

I glanced down at my phone to check the time, and then proceeded to slam my forehead onto the desk when I saw that we still had 40 minutes until the rest of the class would arrive. I just started to drift off and welcome the blissful release of sleep, when I heard a voice begin to sing behind me: quietly at first, but then steadily growing in volume. It was only then that I realised that the boy had moved to sit on top of the desk beside me, and was beginning to serenade me with a dreadful chant that I knew would be stuck in my head for the rest of the day.

“Oh Mickey, you’re so fine, you’re so fine you blow my mind–”

“Don’t you even  _ think _ about singing that godawful song,” I cut in. If I was going to be stuck alone in a classroom with this guy, I wasn’t going to put up with this kind of torture. The boy in question looked slightly annoyed that I had cut his performance short and, for a brief moment, I thought that he would just stop and leave me alone - of course, I should have known that I would have no such luck. He slowly leaned forward towards me whilst still sitting on the desk, before he spread his arms wide and opened his mouth, with an almost innocent expression on his face. I was momentarily transfixed by his sudden change in demeanor, but I quickly snapped out of it after I realised what he was about to do.

“I can show you the wooooorld⁓ Shining, shimmering spleeeeendid⁓, tell me, Princess,” and at that he looked me dead in the eyes and gave me an eyebrow wiggle. Right, that’s it, I’ve had enough of this guy’s shit! I suddenly stood up from my chair and slammed my hands down onto the desk in front of me, my eyes glaring daggers into those stupid amber eyes that looked mildly taken aback by my sudden ferocious outbreak. 

“I don’t care who you are, I don’t even care that I’m stuck in this room with you right now, but I what I do care about is my freaking  _ sanity _ , and if you don’t quit that relentless squawking that you call singing, I’m going to seriously lose it!” I rambled, my voice growing in volume as I released my anger. While the boy in front of me regained his composure, I simply plopped back down into my seat and dropped my head into my hands, praying that other people would start filing into the classroom soon so that I wouldn’t have to keep dealing with this guy. 

I guessed about 20 minutes had passed before the bell rang, followed by the sound of shoes shuffling into the classroom. Luckily, the tawny-eyed boy had since returned to my ex-desk at the back of the room after my outburst, so I had been left alone to calm down and compose myself before I faced my classmates. 

I slowly lifted my head up from my hands, and glanced around at the people coming into the classroom, smiling at some and returning a few brief greetings - but the faces that I wanted to see hadn’t appeared yet, and I somehow knew that they wouldn’t be appearing through that door anytime soon. 

My face fell with disappointment, but was quickly replaced with a small smile as I saw my favourite teacher enter the room with the register in his hand. Mr Karasuma strode confidently into our classroom with the same blank expression that he always held, before casting a fleeting glance around the room and quickly taking attendance.

Everyone then settled down into their desks and stopped their chattering; I was fortunate enough to have been sitting in one of the unoccupied desks at the front, so I didn’t have to suffer the embarrassment of being asked to move from someone else’s desk. 

“Hello class, welcome back to school,” Mr Karasuma began, “I hope you’ve all had a good rest and are ready to put in lots of hard work this year.” At that, the whole class groaned but were quickly silenced again by a brief glare from our teacher. “As some of you may have noticed, we have a new student sitting with us today. He’s a transfer student, and his name is Karma Akabane - actually Karma, how about you come to the front of the classroom and tell us about yourself?”

The boy in question stood up calmly and gave a shrug, before sauntering to the front of the room and standing next to the teacher’s desk. He cast an almost unnoticeable smirk in my direction, and then opened his mouth to begin talking.

“Yo, so as you’ve heard, my name is Karma and my hobbies are…. Well, you’ll all just have to get to know me better to find out.” With that, he flashed everyone a charming smile and most of the girls blushed and began to whisper excitedly to each other. Hell, even some of the guys began to talk enthusiastically about our new classmate - but I could see through that fake exterior of his, and I knew what a sadistic, harassing asshole he really was. 

He turned to me and his grin widened even further, only causing my scowl to deepen as he gave a small wave and strolled back to his– sorry,  _ my  _ desk. Well, at least I now had a name for this grade A douchebag so that I no longer had to call him ‘asshole’ in my head. My eyes snapped back to the front of the classroom as Mr Karasuma cleared his throat to capture our attention once again.

“So, I’m going to need a volunteer to stick with Karma here and make him feel welcome. You know the drill: show him around, introduce him to people, basically just try to get him used to our system as quickly as possible.” Before he could even finish speaking, several enthusiastic hands shot into the air - honestly, I don’t know how he has fooled so many people already, almost everyone wanted to be that one lucky person that would stick by his side for most of the year as he got used to the school. 

Obviously I kept my hand down, as I wasn’t too keen on subjecting myself to a year of torture. Our teacher’s eyes scoured the room in search for a suitable volunteer (or in my eyes, a sacrifice), until they landed on me.  _ Don’t you dare _ I thought, pleading with my eyes to my favourite teacher.

“Nagisa, you will be in charge of taking care of Karma and getting him settled in. I expect you to be polite, and to set a good example for what our expectations are at this school.” My jaw fell open as the school bell rang once more. I sat completely still in my seat while the others stood up and filed out of the classroom. This had to be a joke. A light punch to my shoulder pulled me out of my state of shock, and I looked up to see Karma standing before me, grinning like a Cheshire cat with eyes that were practically sparkling.

“Come on  _ Nagisa _ , we don’t want to be late for our first class,” he said with a wink. I reluctantly stood up from my seat and began to mentally prepare myself for what will surely be a year of hell. “Cheer up dude, at least we have each other!” I stomped out of the classroom clutching my bag, not even needing to glance up to see that his stupid smirk hadn’t left his face. Damn. I hate this guy. 


	2. A Frustrating Talent

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! So I'm back with another update, and I also just wanted to let you guys know that I plan on updating on Fridays from now on :) So anyways, hope you enjoy the chapter!

My legs paced down the familiar corridors of the school to our first lesson of the year and, oh joy, it was one of my least favourite subjects: drama. I was trying desperately to zone out of Karma’s constant whinging about how complicated the hallways are - seriously, does this guy not understand that I literally could not care less?

Thankfully, the drama studio wasn’t too far away from where we were, so it only took around 2 minutes to get there; even though we were the last people to arrive, our drama professor still hadn’t arrived, so at least we wouldn’t get in trouble on the first day of school. We joined the rest of the class in the circle of chairs that surrounded the teacher’s chair - trust me, we didn’t arrange it like that, but our crazy professor insisted that we set it out like that so that he could spin around and see everyone that way. The double doors at the entrance of the studio were suddenly flung open and Korosensei strode confidently into the room, before taking his seat in the middle of the circle in his expensive swivel chair.

“Good morning everyone! I hope you had an excellent rest over the summer and have rejuvenated those bodies in preparation for some splendid acting!” Everyone sighed at this, but we were secretly thankful that he was in a good mood today - he was a very unpredictable man, and you can normally never tell what mood he’s in until he talks to you.

“Well, we have no time for dawdling today, as we need to jump right into things,” he began. “Now, most of you are aware of the main drama event every year, but for our new student I shall explain what I mean.” Oh God, he has never mentioned the annual school play before. Is it our turn this year? Dear Lord, please don’t let it be!

“Every year at Kunugigaoka High School, a class is selected to perform the annual school play - the professor in charge of that class comes up with the concept and the script, so all the class has to do is practise and perform to the best of their abilities.” I don’t like where this is going; he’s being way too cool and collected, just like the calm before the storm. This had better not be heading in the direction that I think it is…

“You will all be thrilled to know that we have been selected to perform the school play this year!” An outbreak of protests and shouts suddenly exploded from the students, as everyone (apart from Karma) was absolutely furious about what we had just been told, myself included. Not only will we be forced onto the stage to perform in front of hundreds of people, but who knows what kind of crazy concept our teacher will come up with?

I shivered at the thought of what some other classes were forced to perform - one year, the whole class that were selected had to dress up like demonic wizards and hang from the building rafters. If a normal drama teacher chose an idea like that, then we are absolutely doomed with the demented idea that our mad professor will come up with.

“Okay, settle down class! Please don’t think of this as an obligation, but rather as an opportunity to express yourself. I’m sure many of you would rather be anywhere else than on a stage, so hopefully we can work on improving your confidence as well this year!” Even though Korosensei seems to understand our lack of enthusiasm, he has the ridiculous notion that he can just fix them with no problems - sorry to break it to you professor, but some things just can’t be fixed. I rolled my eyes at his overly-optimistic attitude, but waited for him to continue speaking anyway.

“I have already written the script for our performance, so now all I need to do is decide which roles are suitable for each student - and before you say anything, I will be holding auditions this lesson to determine who is suitable for a main role based on their acting skills!” After his explanation of what’s going on, Korosensei split us into groups of five and auditioned us one group at a time. By the time this happened, I noticed that my friends must have slipped into the room without anyone knowing - I was overjoyed that I finally had some sort of escape from the irritating transfer student.

I was even happier when the professor put me in a group with my friends, even though Karma was in our group too. After a few quick greetings between us as well as an introduction from Karma, we all walked to the front of the classroom and picked up the scripts to look over whilst other groups were being auditioned. As my eyes swept across the text in front of me, I let out an internal groan at what we were going to be performing - something about undercover assassins. It could be better, but at least this wasn’t some kind of mushy romance story.

“Okie dokie, Nagisa and team are up next, come here guys!” I quirked an eyebrow at Korosensei’s interesting choice of language, but strolled up to him nonetheless with my ‘team’ trailing after me. Ritsu went first, followed soon after by Kayano and then Sugino - I had to admit, they were all pretty decent actors and recited the script with confidence and ease. However, I was called to go next and I knew that I would be nowhere near as convincing as the rest of them were. Whatever, I didn’t care about drama anyway. I casually placed a hand into my left pocket and started to recite the script with little enthusiasm.

“Ash, no, open your eyes. Please look at me,” I began, and even I was unimpressed by my monotonous drawl. Oh well, I don’t even want a part in this play, so there’s no point trying to be enthusiastic. “You can’t leave me. Please.” I inwardly rolled my eyes at this sappy one-sided exchange, but I pressed on and rushed the last line to get this over with. “Ash, don’t you dare give up. I can’t be alone again.”

I looked up to see my friends giving me a deadpan look, but when I glanced over at Korosensei I saw that he had some kind of glint in his eye. Whatever… I must be seeing things. I shrugged and joined the rest of my group before Karma stepped away from us and stood in front of Korosensei, ready to start. He closed his eyes momentarily, and when they opened, those amber eyes looked full of anguish. His bottom lip wobbled before he opened his mouth and started his performance.

“Ash, n-no, open your eyes,” he began, a deliberate stutter making his voice sound distraught and panicked. He was now crouching down and focusing his eyes on one particular spot on the floor, as if ‘Ash’ really were lying down in front of him.  “Please, look at me!” The sudden outburst made his already weak voice crack slightly, as if he were actually holding back tears - damn, how was he so convincing? “You can’t leave me. Please…” he softly whispered as he ran his hand down his face, his eyes beginning to take on a watery quality.

Before carrying on with his delivery, Karma covered his eyes with one hand, the other one encircling his legs and making him look small and vulnerable. “Ash, don’t you dare give up,” he forced out through gritted teeth, and I swear I saw a stray tear trickle down his face, before he opened his eyes once again, but now they looked utterly grief-stricken as if he were recalling some awful memory. “I can’t be alone again…” he whispered, the barely audible noise echoing around the now-silent drama studio.

Karma then cleared his throat and rubbed his eyes, before standing up again and glancing around the room at the whole class, who had been shocked into silence. Even I was speechless. How did he do that? Even though I hated to admit it, he was seriously talented, and I knew that he would get a main role in the play. Korosensei was the first to break the silence, but he simply thanked our group and called up the next group for their auditions after jotting down some brief notes about each of our performances.

After a brief moment, everyone started talking again as if nothing had just happened, but all of my friends remained silent and simply stared at Karma in awe. For a second, I thought that Karma didn’t notice the attention, or if he was then he was just choosing to ignore it. However, he soon turned his head to me and gave me a cocky grin, which was swiftly followed by a scowl from me.

“See Nagisa, that’s how true acting is done,” he said, his smirk growing even wider when I didn’t respond; instead, I huffed and turned my back to him to hide how annoyed I really was. Yeh, I know: not very mature, but I didn’t want him seeing how much his natural talent really irritated me. Whatever, we don’t even like each other so it’s not like he expected me to give him a gold star for his performance.

While the other auditions took place, my friends and I talked about a bunch of stuff (mainly about our holidays), and surprisingly Karma was being very quiet and didn’t interrupt us - he was being so quiet in fact, that I actually started to get suspicious. Was he planning something? Did it have to do with me? I didn’t realise that I was totally in my own reality until the bold voice of Korosensei cut through my thoughts. I jumped a little at his loud voice, and heard a quiet snickering coming from behind me. I snapped my head around quickly and, after seeing that it was Karma, glared daggers at him before turning back around to pay attention to the teacher.

“Well, I have to say that today was such an enlightening experience; all of you had so much talent to offer! I have actually already decided who will be playing the main roles in this play, but don’t worry if you weren’t selected - after all, everyone will be playing a part in this play!” Several people rolled their eyes at that (myself included), but most people just looked anxious to see who had been chosen for the lead roles.

“Okay, no more dilly dallying,” he continued, “I’m sure that it will come as no surprise to most of you that one of the main actors in our annual school play is… Karma! Congratulations, I know that you will really master the act of portraying the character that I’m giving you.” With that, he flashed Karma a huge smile and a thumbs up to really emphasise his confidence in Karma’s performing skills.

“Now, my next casting choice in an interesting one, but I have complete faith that they will be able to pull of their role.” I was actually really interested to find out who would be picked for the other lead role: it had to be someone skilled, most likely someone that would work well with Karma. Honestly, my bets were on someone from my group - could it be Kayano? Maybe it was Ritsu…

I snapped out of my daydream when I noticed that everyone in the room was looking at me. Huh? I looked around hesitantly and my eyes rested on Korosensei who, oddly enough, was smiling at me.

“Well done Nagisa - You are to play the other main role in the school play this year!” My jaw literally dropped open in shock. He had to be joking - right? I let out a nervous chuckle, but quickly stopped after I saw that everyone looked completely serious.

“W-What...?” I stuttered, still in complete denial that any of this was real.

“Nagisa,” Korosensei began, “I have chosen you for this important role, as I can clearly see your potential. I have no doubts in my mind that, after a little tutoring, you could be one of the best actors in this room.” I heard many people scoff at that, sounding a little offended at our teacher’s comment, but I could feel anger start to bubble up inside of me. Who the hell was that stupid? He could clearly see that I wanted no part of this play but oh no, I just had _too much potential_ that could go to waste!

I clenched my fist by my side and was about to give him a whole rebuttal showdown, but luckily enough (though I didn’t want to admit it), Karma put his hand on my shoulder and gave me a fierce look that told me not to go there. Urgh, get that hand off me! Who knows where that could have been? I roughly shook his hand off me and simply scowled, waiting for Korosensei to tell us what to do next.

“Okay, so now that we have selected our star actors, let’s see how they can perform together!” My eyes widened at our teacher’s enthusiastic request, while Karma looked totally unfazed. Hell fricking _no_ ! I am drawing the line right there, there was no chance in _hell_ that I was acting alongside Karma, especially not in front of the whole class! Despite my protests, I was roughly shoved into the middle of the room, inside the circle of chairs.

I gulped audibly, now becoming more nervous than angry; I hated acting in front of everybody. If it were just a few people then sure, I didn’t really mind, but I knew for sure that there were some people in my class that would laugh at my miserable attempt at acting. What made it even worse though, was the fact that Karma was so much better than me, and now it would be painfully obvious.

As I stood inside the ring of people, Korosensei moved his chair out of the way so that we had more space to move, and then gave the both of us a different script this time. I knew that I was probably overreacting at this point, but I literally felt sick and felt my heart begin to race - wait, did I seriously have social anxiety issues? Great, what a perfect time to discover that helpful piece of information . The room then visibly darkened and a spotlight shone brightly onto Karma and I. I whipped my head round to look at Korosensei who was fiddling with the lighting options, panic clearly etched onto my face.

“Please, sir!” I heard myself start to beg. “I’ll do anything you want me to - give me detention for the rest of the year but _please_ , don’t make me do this!” Oh god, I needed to breathe, come on. The last thing I needed to do was pass out in the middle of the room. I vaguely saw Karma in my peripheral vision rolling his eyes as he continued reading over the new script.

“Don’t panic my boy, believe in yourself” Korosensei tried to reassure me, “stop thinking about it too much! I strongly believe that you are the only one who can portray this particular character convincingly enough.” He clearly wasn’t going to accept my bargaining, so I turned back around to face Karma and tried to compose myself. I quickly scanned over the highlighted lines on the paper in front of me, but it was rather hard to with my hands shaking like I was having goddamn seizure.

Karma then cleared his throat and preceded to get himself in character, while I gave myself a mental pep talk. I could totally do this. Yep, no problem at all. Shit… I’m totally screwed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol, Korosensei totally ships it XD  
> Once again, please don't be a stranger and drop me a comment to let me know how I did! Also, I want to emphasise that this is going to be a VERY slow build, and I also don't plan on including any smut (unless you guys want it ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)). See you guys next week, love you! x


	3. Damn Ties

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! So this time I actually have a few things to say instead of just some mindless babbling (●＾曲＾●)  
> 1\. First of all, I just wanted to say thank you so much to everyone for their kudos, bookmarks and comments. I'm not kidding when I say that it totally makes my day!  
> 2\. As you have probably noticed, the characters are kinda OOC, so if you don't like it then I suggest you don't read the rest of this fic. It actually wasn't intentional, but they ended up being written that way!  
> 3\. Most of this chapter was written totally last minute (i.e last night and this morning), so I apologise in advance for any misspellings, etc.  
> Anyways, I hope you enjoy this chapter!

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath to try and calm myself down, but I could still feel my heart pounding incessantly in my chest. Jesus Christ on a cracker, I’m not ready! When I peeked my eyes open again, I caught a glimpse of Karma looking at me with a strange expression on his face. As soon as his eyes met mine though, they snapped away again - seriously, what was he up to? He awkwardly cleared his throat and proceeded to begin his performance.

“Remember Ash,” he muttered, “we have to be in and out of here as soon as possible.” After sauntering up to my side, Karma flashed me a devilish smirk that instantly put a frown on my face. He then leaned towards me and snaked a hand around my waist, making me jump. I had to try my hardest not to punch him in the face . _It’s only an act, he has to do this,_ I repeated in my head. I then realised that it was my turn to speak.

“You don’t have to remind me,” I murmured through grit teeth, “but please remember that this is just an act; so get your filthy hand off me before I chop it off.” Damn, now I can see why Korosensei chose me to play this character: he says just what I’m thinking. A flash of pain crossed Karma’s face as he slowly retracted his hand, but a millisecond later his previous grin reappeared as if nothing had just happened.

“Don’t have to tell me twice, dollface,” he whispered, before the smile dropped off his face and he looked at me completely seriously. “But unless you want to blow your cover, I suggest you suck it up for a couple of hours and at least _try_ to pull off a convincing act.” My eyes widened at his dangerous tone and I nodded my head. I glanced back down to my script and tried to pull myself together.

Wait, what? I narrowed my eyes at what was written in the stage directions, and I instantly knew that Karma had seen it too by the sly grin that had appeared on his face. And at that precise moment, I realised what the weird plot twist of this play was going to be. I knew that the concept was too simple at first glance, and I had been confused as to why our crazy drama teacher had gone for such a ‘normal’ concept. ‘ _What is this plot twist?’_ I hear you cry - well, to put it simply, this year’s school play was going to be a _goddamn romance story_.

Following the script perfectly like the sick sadist he was, Karma reached down and laced his fingers in mine, then leaned down to brush his lips on the shell of my ear.

“You're finally mine now, even if it’s just for a few hours - and even better, there’s nothing you can do about it.” I heard stifled laughter coming from somewhere in the audience, and I had to try my hardest not to flip them off. Fortunately though, I only had one line left and then this nightmare performance would be over.

“Whatever, let’s just find our target and put a bullet through his brain. Have your fun, Theo, because I’m going to make sure that it doesn’t last.” After growling out the last word, I ripped my hand out of Karma’s and sat back down in my chair, folding my arms and preparing to sulk for the rest of the lesson.

Korosensei swiftly turned the lights back on and rolled his chair back into the ring of students, looking thoroughly pleased. _I don’t know what he’s looking so happy about,_ I thought bitterly.

“Well done guys! That was a great performance, very convincing too. Now, we’re approaching the end of this lesson so I want to thank everyone for their hard work today, and to let you guys know that our future drama lessons are solely for rehearsing.” _Oh joy, I can’t wait!_ Said no one ever.

“However, some of you may need to learn your lines and such outside of class, especially those of you with bigger roles.” Congratulations sir, you were just demoted to my least favourite teacher.

“Oh! Before I forget, what I said earlier to you was true, Nagisa: you are a diamond in the rough, and just need a bit of polishing to sparkle! And I can’t think of anyone better to polish you than your co-star, Karma - so, he is to become your mentor in order to pass his wisdom onto you.” I felt numb. This couldn’t possibly get any worse.

“As a result, you will both be given copies of the full script, and are required to rehearse every day after school. After two weeks, I shall review your progress personally, and make any necessary adjustments to this schedule. Ah, and the drama studio is open every day until 6pm should you choose to use it.”

I felt like crying. How could he do this to me? Was this a punishment for something? Oh god, I think I might be going into shock. My breath caught in my throat and I wanted to throw myself off a bridge - how could I possibly spend more time with this guy? I was going to go insane. I’ve barely spent a few hours with this guy, and I already want to strangle him.

The bell signalling the end of the lesson then sharply rang, cutting through the silence like a knife. I stood up slowly with my bag at my side, and began to trail my way out of the door with my head down to avoid looking at anyone. The whole class parted like the Red Sea in front of me, clearly sensing my gloomy aura; even my friends kept their distance away from me, mainly because they knew not to talk to me when I was royally pissed off.

-x-

The rest of the day passed by excruciatingly slowly, and I couldn’t focus on anything. My friends kept shooting me worried glances, but I just ignored them in favour of wallowing in my own self pity.

Eventually, the final bell rang and everyone practically ran out the door to get home. They were so lucky. I walked slowly to my locker and when I opened it, a small piece of paper fell out. I opened it up with little enthusiasm, and dragged my eyes over the simple note written in neat handwriting.

_Something’s come up_

_I’ll be late_

_Wait for me_

_~K_

I scoffed at the selfish message, but pocketed the note anyway. Wait, how did he know my locker number? Letting out a deep sigh I decided that I didn’t really care, so I put my books away and shut the door again. As I leaned back onto it, I closed my eyes. Tch, he didn’t even say where to meet him. Oh well, if he’s going to waste my time, then he can find me himself. Pompous bastard.

After about 10 minutes, I started to become suspicious. Where the hell was he? I pushed myself off my locker indignantly and decided to go search for him; in the end, I would rather put aside my stubbornness to get this rehearsal over and done with as soon as possible.

The school was mostly empty by this point, apart from a few students who had detention or were going to their after school clubs. It didn’t take me too long to wander down the english corridor, and there stood Karma leaning against his own locker with his head turned away from me. An evil grin crept up onto my face as I formulated a quick plan in my head. Heh, he’ll never see me coming. I carefully crept up to him, thanking my ninja skills for making my footsteps silent.

I then lunged forward to shove his shoulder, but Karma’s head swiftly turned at the last minute and his hand flew up to catch my fist. My grin was replaced with a grimace and I clenched my teeth at the force of his death grip. _Hide your pain, Nagisa, you still can still get him!_ I should really stop talking to myself, but whatever.

Listening to my inner voice, I raised my other fist and swung it into Karma’s face, but I should have known better than to doubt his lightning-fast reactions. He caught my other hand with ease, a smug grin making its way onto his face. Dammit, I can’t give up!

I then swung my leg out to try and kick him in the shin, but he just swatted my leg away with one of his. Fine. I can accept defeat this time. Next time, though, I won’t be as forgiving…

Relaxing my muscles, I fixed Karma with the foulest scowl I could muster. He simply scoffed at my attempt to be intimidating and finally released my hands, before turning around and walking away from me. I was about to yell at him, but then realised that he was actually walking to the drama studio. Tch, this guy brings out the worst in me. When did I get so violent? I resolved to try and keep my cool around him, otherwise he could trigger another weird rush of anger; I’m not usually such a hotheaded person.

I quickly trotted down the hall to catch up with Karma, and we soon entered the drama studio. Okay, the sooner we start this, the sooner we can get this over with and go home. With a new sense of determination, I strode to the front of the room where there were copies of the full script for the school play sitting innocently on Korosensei’s chair - I will master you, damned script, even if it’s the last thing I do!

“Alright Karma, let’s begin!” I declared, a smirk tugging at my lips as Karma’s eyes widened, clearly taken aback by the complete 180° of my attitude. However, my small moment of victory was short lived, as Karma quickly composed himself again and flashed me a wicked grin.

“Sure thing, _cupcake_ ,” he taunted, clearly trying to piss me off; and honestly, it was kind of working, but it was gonna take more than that to get me to snap! I clenched my jaw shut to stop me from retorting with a snappy comeback, and simply thrust another copy of the script into his hands. Alright, I guess we should start from the beginning.

“Stop dawdling around Theo,” I began with little hesitation, “your tie is completely messed up, so either take it off or do it properly. I honestly don’t care which, but I’m leaving in 1 minute, with or without you.” I noticed that my voice held a little more emotion this time, which I was thankful for as it meant that I needed less time being ‘mentored’ about my terrible acting skills.

“Tch, shut up. You know you can’t leave here without me,” Karma drawled, smirking slightly as he looked straight into my eyes with a determined cockiness. He then turned his whole body to face me and crooked a finger in my direction, a cheeky glint shining in his amber eyes. As per the script, I cautiously walked towards him; so far, this scene had been relatively easy to perform, as it doesn’t take much effort to act like a pissed off guy with an attitude.

Actually, these characters behave in a way that is eerily similar to our actual personalities - oh god, I hope Korosensei doesn’t have anything weird planned. I came to a stop about a metre away from Karma, waiting for him to deliver his next lines. Instead, I almost had a heart attack as he quickly darted towards me and ripped my school tie off my neck The action was so sudden and rough, that my skin stung in pain; I lifted my hand to cradle my sore neck as I sent a venomous scowl in Karma’s direction.  

“Argh! That fricking hurt, asshole!” I snapped, anger coursing through my veins. It didn’t seem to phase Karma in the slightest though, as that stupid smirk never left his face. Instead, he waggled his finger at me in mock disapproval and clicked his tongue.

“No, no, angel cakes, you must stay in character if you want to be a successful actor!” Oh my god, I swear he is going to be the death of me. Have I said that before? Probably, but I seriously can’t emphasise it enough! I took a deep breath to calm myself down, and dug my fingernails into the palms of my hands to focus on something other than my utter hatred for this guy.

After a minute of silence (i.e me glaring at the jerk in front of me), Karma hung my tie around his neck and looked with a bashful expression, once again going into character.

“In all honesty, um…” He awkwardly scratched at the back of his neck and looked genuinely sheepish - I still can’t get over the fact that he can be a total jerkwad one minute, and then be a totally different person (literally) the next.

“I ah, actually don’t know how to tie a tie,” he mumbled timidly, and cast his eyes downwards to avoid my eyes. I took that as my cue, and stepped back towards Karma so that he was within arm’s reach.

“God, you’re so useless,” I whispered under my breath as I reached up and attempted to tie Karma’s‒ sorry, _my_ tie. _Attempted_ being the key word here. I clumsily fumbled around, desperately trying to tie this thing properly.

“Hey, um, don’t you know how to tie a tie…?” Karma wondered, the genuine confusion evident in his voice, and I realised that he was no longer acting. I began to feel heat creep up my neck, and dipped my head down to try and hide my flushed cheeks, still awkwardly trying to get this damn thing to tie properly. I soon gave up and caved under Karma’s intense gaze, lowering my head further and stepping away from him.

“Wait, if you can’t tie a tie, then how were you wearing one today?”

It was apparently an innocent question and didn’t seem to have any malice behind it, but I still wanted to crawl into a hole and die of embarrassment. I’d hoped he hadn’t noticed…

“W-Well,” I began, cursing myself for stuttering, “Um… I normally wear one of those, er, clip-on thingies…” Wow, well done Nagisa. Thingies? Really?

“Er,” I continued, my confidence slowly diminishing with every word, “but today… um, I had a little issue at home,” I continued, now blushing to the tips of my ears and looking anywhere apart from Karma.

“Wait, that came out wrong… er, nothing bad happened…” Jeez, even _I_ thought that I was being pathetic right now. Urgh, whatever! Curse you, inner monologue!

“So I kinda lost my normal tie but mymumwouldn’tletmeleavethehousesoshefoundthisoneandtieditforme” I rushed, breathing heavily afterwards to regain my breath. Well, that’s one way to avoid beating around the bush.

I finally looked up to meet Karma’s gaze and saw that he was looking at me incredulously.

“Dude, chill. I don’t care if your freaking dog tied your tie, I was just curious,” he retorted, and I was shocked by the amount of sincerity in his tone. Wait, was he trying to make me feel better…?

“But if you insist on being so incompetent, then I guess we have to waste the rest of this session by teaching you how to tie a damn tie.”

Okay, I take it back. He wasn’t trying to make me feel better; in fact, he only succeeded in making me feel much worse. However, I begrudgingly admitted that my only real chance of pulling this off was by getting Karma to teach me not only how to act, but how to do it convincingly. Besides, I have to learn how to do this at some point.

We ended up spending the next 45 minutes Googling and watching endless videos on how to tie a decent looking tie, and eventually I got the hang of it. By the time we had run through the first page of the script, it was getting late.

“We didn’t get much done today,” I complained, secretly annoyed that I wasted so much time learning something that I could have done at home.

“And whose fault is that? Whatever, tomorrow I think we should analyse how assassins are supposed to be portrayed. After all, there’s no point learning the rest of the script if we don’t even understand our characters.”

He actually had a point there. I sighed and nodded my head, relieved that we could at least get on during our rehearsals; my life would be a nightmare if Karma kept pushing my buttons 24/7.

After shoving the script into my bag, I just left the drama studio and didn’t bother saying goodbye to Karma. We’re still not friends, even if we can put up with each other for a couple of hours after school. I started strolling home, enjoying the deserted streets. That night, I slept restlessly, dreaming of plays, school and damn ties.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Also, I would really like to know if you guys actually read the chapter titles? I totally don't mind if you don't, I just want to know so that I can put in more effort or if I don't need to (*＾v＾*)  
> Love you all! x


	4. We're Going On A Trip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, I'm back with another update! I've decided to change my upload schedule to Saturdays instead of Fridays now, so that's why this chapter is a day later than usual. This is mainly because I'm going back to school next week, so it would be hard for me to update on a school day. Anyways, hope you enjoy this chapter!

The next morning, my alarm clock chose to take the day off, so I woke up late; oh Jesus Christ on a bike, why did that have to happen?! I ran downstairs and put some bread in the toaster, before running back upstairs and rushing to get dressed. I absolutely _hate_ waking up late, as you will _always_ forget something - I would soon learn this, but not before I grabbed my toast and ran out the door with my school bag thrown over my shoulder.

I arrived at school just as the bell rang, huffing and puffing from practically sprinting there. As I walked down the halls with my eyes still half-closed, I accidentally bumped into someone. I couldn’t be bothered to see who it was, so I just mumbled an apology and carried on shuffling along the corridor like a zombie, not really caring if I was a bit late for class; after all, it was only art.

Clearly not learning from before, I once again smacked right into someone’s chest, and raised my exhausted eyes to see who it was.

“My my, if it isn’t my favourite bluenette!” Hm? I know that voice…

As I peeked upwards even further, my eyes were met with those amber orbs that I had grown to hate so much. Still in my sleepy daze, I tried to shove Karma away; I was really not in the mood for his sarcastic comments today. However, my weak arms barely grazed him, and I let out an irritated sigh. I tried side-stepping him, but he just mirrored my movements, effectively stopping me from moving forward as well as pissing me off in the process. I opened my mouth to express my annoyance, but he cut me off before I could say anything.

“Dude, have you even looked in the mirror today? You look like you just crawled out of your grave!” Wow, he really had a way with words. I didn’t look that bad, did I?

“Tch, shut up. I’m just tired,” I mumbled in reply, wincing at my gravelly voice.

“Seriously though, that is a delectable shade of purple under your eyes - what brand is that?” A smile dangled on the corner of his lips, and I could tell that he was testing how far he could push me today. I just rolled my eyes, not going to give him the satisfaction of getting a rise out of me. Karma’s eyes then widened a fraction as they darted down to look at the rest of my body. I suddenly felt really self-conscious - what was he looking at? His smirk grew, and I began to feel even more uncomfortable with his eyes still darting over my figure, before he cleared his throat and caught my gaze again.

“Have you forgotten something today, or are you trying to set a new fashion trend?”

I immediately looked downwards to take in my appearance and inhaled a sharp breath as I looked in horror at what I was wearing. Luckily I was wearing my normal school trousers and shoes (thank god), but my top half was a completely different story. My shirt was missing. So here I was: late for class, standing with my least-favourite person, and wearing a waistcoat _without_ the shirt.

What was I going to do? I could feel my cheeks start to heat up, mortified that people had seen me like this. I breathed deeply, desperately racking my brains for an answer as to what the hell I was going to do - could I just ditch school and go home to change? No, I’ve never ditched class before, and I’m definitely not going to on the second day of school. Karma abruptly cleared his throat and I jumped slightly, having forgotten that he was actually there.

“You’re very lucky that I’m in a good mood today,” he mused to himself. I looked at him questioningly, confused as to what he was even talking about. All of a sudden, he grabbed my wrist and gave it a firm tug, before pulling me down the hall. I let out a little yelp of surprise and tried to yank my hand out of his grip, but soon gave up and just concentrated on keeping up with Karma’s long-legged stride. Where the hell was he taking me?

After a minute or so of virtually trotting down the halls (curse you, short legs), we ground to a halt inside the boy’s locker room and I was finally released from that iron grip. I rubbed at my wrist, trying to alleviate some of the pain, before glowering at Karma for his thoughtless treatment of me. He payed me no attention though, as he was too busy rummaging through a locker - wait, what was he doing? I tried to peer around his shoulder to see what he was doing, when he whipped around and faced me with a toothy grin plastered on his face, looking awfully proud of himself.

“Ta da!” he announced, thrusting a large shirt into my face. I cocked my head at that, confused as to why he showed me this, but then I remembered my certain predicament and gave Karma a wary look.

“Thanks for your concern, but this is clearly _way_ too big for me,” I pointed out, but Karma simply shook his head and dumped the shirt into my hands.

“Well, it’s certainly better than nothing, and it’s the only suitable thing I could find. Ah, I also have this.” He opened his bag and pulled out my school tie, before draping it around my neck with a smug look on his face. I had totally forgotten that he had kept my tie after our rehearsal yesterday, and I didn’t even realise that I had left home without it. I clicked my tongue and shooed Karma away so that I could get changed in privacy.

Once I had finished (in record time, may I add), I jogged out of the locker room, half-expecting Karma to be waiting out there; of course he wasn’t, but I didn’t really care anyway. Oh god, I was so late! I ran down the maze of corridors until I eventually reached the art studio and came to a halt. I paused for a moment to try and catch my breath a little, before I opened the door and ducked my head to apologised for my lateness.

The classroom was totally silent, and as I raised my head, I saw someone totally unexpected.

“Mr Karasuma?” I asked, slightly bewildered that he was here - after all, he was a P.E. teacher.

“Nagisa, I’m not too pleased that you’re late. Don’t let it happen again,” he chided as I dropped into my seat and hung my head in embarrassment.

“As I was explaining, I’m just filling in for your regular art professor, so this is only a temporary arrangement until he can come back to school. Today, the art department has arranged a very fun and educational activity for you guys to do.” I raised my head at that, waiting Mr Karasuma for him to elaborate. What was he talking about?

“The department has already gained consent from your parents, so today we’re going on a field trip!” Most of the class cheered at that - even though it was for art, getting out of school for a day was great, right? After allowing us to quieten down, our teacher continued.

“I’m sure most of you know this, but there’s an old historic town about 45 minutes’ drive from here. Since this was a last-minute trip, we haven’t been able to arrange any formal travel, so we have to take the public bus that will drop us in the middle of town. Alright class, gather up your belongings and follow me.”

We all scrambled to get out the door, as Mr Karasuma quickly marched down the corridor, not waiting for any stragglers that would be left behind. I darted out the door to wait for my friends, who thankfully came out soon after me. After exchanging a few brief smiles, we all speed-walked behind the rest of the class until we caught up with our teacher at the main gates to the school. Fortunately, there was a bus station was right outside the school, so we only had to wait a few minutes for the next one to arrive.

After our teacher had paid for our bus tickets (I actually couldn’t believe that the school would waste their funds on us), we all clambered on board; but to our dismay, it was already half-full with other passengers. Sugino had been at the front of the line and had already nabbed a seat, so I quickly plonked myself down next to him to secure myself a spot - I really didn’t want to be standing up for 45 minutes. For once, I was thankful for my small stature, as it had allowed me to stealthily wiggle my way to the front of the line without anyone noticing; if I was spotted, I had no doubts that I’d get quite few bruises and scrapes.

We all got onto the bus fairly quickly, and I was glad that all of my friends got to sit near each other (Kayano and Ritsu had taken the two seats behind us soon after I sat down). Glancing around the bus, I noticed that Karma was standing with Terasaka’s group near the driver, looking rather bored with the conversation going on around him.

Just as I was about to look away, Karma’s gaze suddenly met mine. Crap, now he’ll think I was staring at him - as if he read my mind, he gave me a cocky wink. I simply rolled my eyes and brought my attention back to Sugino, who had pulled out his earbuds and offered me one with a friendly smile.

For the next 20 minutes or so, we simply listened to his music on shuffle, and I had to admit that he had a great taste in music; we went through songs by Bring Me The Horizon, Muse, Skrillex, and even a bit of K-Pop (B.A.P was now my favourite band). I was also thankful that we didn’t talk much - don’t get me wrong I love talking to my friends, but today was just one of those days where I preferred to simply zone out and listen to music.

My brief moment peace had to be ruined though. Halfway through some random song by Arctic Monkeys, the music suddenly stopped and I turned my head to shoot Sugino a questioning look. A wary smile surfaced on his lips as he began talking slowly, but carefully.

“Nagisa.” His serious tone caught me off-guard and I stiffened, nodding my head for him to continue.

“Me and the others have been thinking. I know you guys don’t really get along, but the rest of us really like Karma.” Uh oh, I don’t like where this is going. I said nothing, making Sugino swallow nervously before he continued.

“I’m just gonna cut to the chase. We want Karma to join the group.” I inhaled a deep breath and blew out slowly, trying not to get mad at my best friend. I turned around to face my other friends behind me to shoot them a skeptical look.

They had clearly been listening into our conversation, as they just smiled and nodded their heads in unison (yeah, that totally wasn’t creepy at all).

“Yep,” Kayano chimed in rather cheerfully, “Karma seems like a great guy, and we’d all like to get to know him more. Maybe the two of you have gotten off on the wrong foot, but I really think that you should at least give him a chance.” It was really hard to stay mad at her when she looked so innocent and hopeful. I huffed in exasperation.

“Fine, but I’ll only put up with him for one day,” I asserted, glancing at all of my friends to make sure that my point was conveyed. They all beamed brightly at me and nodded enthusiastically. Seriously, what was up with their synchronisation today? It was kinda creeping me out…

“Okay! One day, we can do that!” Ritsu exclaimed, clearly enthused at my cooperation. Assuming that the uncomfortable conversation was over, I turned back around to the front of the bus and tried to ignore the loud chattering around me. Even though my friends and I had finished talking, something still felt off about the atmosphere. I tried looking around to see what was making me so unsettled, but I couldn’t see anything out of place, other than a few missing people that had left the bus at the last stop.

I had just closed my eyes and was beginning to doze off, when the bus turned sharply and jolted me awake. Slightly annoyed that my nap had been interrupted, I glared out the window to see that the bus was now winding down some very narrow and wiggly roads. Surely there was a more sensible way of getting to the town?

To annoy me even further, I heard a familiar voice drawling from somewhere behind me. I turned my head, only to be greeted by a familiar tall figure, whose eyes glanced at me with a hint of mischief. Well that was just fantastic. I forced a smile onto my face, not wanting to dampen my friends’ cheerful mood.

“Hey Karma,” I greeted, hoping that my voice didn’t sound as strained as it did in my head.

“Oh hey there Nagisa!” he announced, the false enthusiasm clearly evident in his voice; the others didn’t seem to pick up on it though, which annoyed me even further. Karma obviously wanted to push my buttons even more, so he moved to stand next to me and leaned in closer to talk to Sugino, who spoke animatedly about some recent baseball game. I tried to block out their conversation, but it was rather hard with them literally talking over me.

All of a sudden, the bus violently jerked around a sharp bend and I slammed my eyes shut, waiting for the imminent collision with Sugino - instead, I heard a small yelp next to me and felt something slam into my body with enough force to wind me. Opening my eyes with shock and pain, I was met with a sight that made me freeze.

A pair of bright golden eyes stared back at me in horror, only inches away from my face. I couldn’t comprehend what had just happened, but I quickly snapped out of my trance. Only then did I realise the compromising position that me and Karma were in: he was positively sprawled across my lap, clutching onto my torso for support.

After a second of staring at me in disbelief, Karma pushed off me roughly and turned around to rush hurriedly back to the front of the bus where he was standing earlier. Before he turned around completely, I swore I caught a glimpse of his face looking oddly flushed - wait was he blushing? That was completely ridiculous though, I bet he was just angry.

I cleared my throat and tilted my head to look at Sugino, praying that he didn’t just see that. A light smile played on his lips as he looked out the window, and I thanked the gods that he didn’t say anything. I breathed out in relief, grateful that no one had just seen that awkward little performance; if they had done, I honestly don’t know how I would have recovered from the embarrassment. As I gazed out the window to try and calm down, I realised that the rest of this journey was going to go very slowly.

-x-

_Kayano’s POV_

When the bus swerved sharply, I almost slammed into Ritsu; luckily though, caught myself by gripping onto the handlebar in front of me. Nagisa, however, was not so lucky (well, in his opinion anyway). Karma had landed directly in his lap, their faces merely inches away from one another. Before they could move, I quickly whipped out my phone and snapped several pictures of their interesting position, a sly grin creeping onto my face.

“Hey Ritsu,” I murmured, “Take a look at these.” As I flicked through the pictures, Ritsu’s eyes widened and glistened with wonder.

“You know what we have to do, right?” She whispered excitedly, keeping her voice down so that Nagisa couldn’t hear. My grin widened.

“I was thinking the exact same thing. Now all we have to do is get Sugino on board, and we can begin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you so much for reading! Please leave me a comment if you liked this chapter, it honestly means so much to me and it always makes my day. Also, I'm not planning on doing different POVs often at all, but this was necessary for later chapters (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧  
> See you guys next week, love you!  
> °˖✧◝(＾▽＾)◜✧˖°


	5. Snapshot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M BACKKKKKKKKK!!!! So sorry for the massive hiatus, but things have just been a bit manic over the past couple of weeks and I didn't have any inspiration to write. But anyway, thanks so much to everyone who's been commenting and leaving kudos - honestly, you guys always make me feel better about myself and help me carry on writing. So without any further ado, let's delve right into this chapter!

We soon arrived at our stop and quickly exited the bus. The town was actually really beautiful - I can’t believe that I’d never heard of it before, but then again I wasn’t really into all that ‘artistic’ stuff. Before we could spend too long gawking at the pleasant scenery around us, Mr Karasuma called us to gather around him.

“Now we’re not here to just waste a day away school; you actually have an assignment from your regular teacher, and for that you need to get into pairs.”Well, it was kinda obvious who I wanted to pair up with, so I turned around and gave him a subtle wink as if to telepathically convey my message to him. Sugino just returned a dopey grin and seemed to understand what I wanted. I let out a small sigh of relief - things had finally gone my way! The rest of the class started chattering excitedly, but soon stopped after our teacher narrowed his eyes at us.

“You can sort out who you’re going with later, but for now I’ll keep this brief. You’re going to be starting a new project this year called ‘Emotion’, and you have to go around town with your partner to take photos relating to this theme. I assume most of you have mobiles that you can use, but if you don’t then find a partner who does as there are no cameras available.” Some people looked around worriedly at that, but I didn’t panic as I knew that both Sugino and I had phones on us - mine was a more recent model though, so I assumed that we would be using mine.

“And one more thing before you’re free to go,” Mr Karasuma continued. “There’s going to be a competition for the best photo, and there will be a prize. So get out there and take some great photos!”

At the mention of a competition, everyone’s faces suddenly became very serious and they all stiffened - uh oh, I don’t think our art professor knew about how competitive our class was, especially when a prize was involved. I inwardly grimaced at the thought of what people have done to win in the past - trust me, none of it was pretty. Hopefully now that we were around the public, people would calm down a bit and not be so aggressive (I wouldn’t hold my breath though).

After everyone had chosen a partner, several people immediately dispersed down different paths to explore the town and try to find inspiration. Before Sugino and I left the group though, I couldn’t help but rest my eyes on a certain redhead to see who he’d partnered with. My eyes widened when I saw that he was standing with a cheerful Isogai - I was actually rather surprised to see them together, but in the end I didn’t care who he went with as long as he stayed away from me.

A commotion was going on somewhere down the road, so Sugino and I left to go and see what was going on. After turning a corner, we were met with quite an amusing sight that prompted me to raise my phone and snap a picture. Terasaka was practically begging with a random woman on the street, and from what I could make of their conversation, he was asking her to model for him. Unfortunately, the lady didn’t seem to be in a very sporting mood as her lips were screwed into irritation and she was clearly arguing back at Terasaka. Itona was standing behind his partner, hiding his face with shame. A smirk twitched at my lips as I quickly took a snapshot of the interesting scene before me - after all, there were many emotions going on here, and it would have been a waste not to take advantage of the moment.

After that brief moment of amusement, I regained my composure and turned back around to head down a narrow alley with Sugino following close behind me. The small backstreet soon opened up to an abandoned courtyard with vines twisting and wrapping around the cracked bricks of the seemingly ancient ruins that surrounded us.

Sugino let out a low whistle of amazement, and we both simply stared at the utter beauty surrounding us - it may sound sappy, but it was truly an amazing sight to behold. I snapped a couple of photos of everything around us before passing my phone to Sugino and letting him take a few; after all, it was _our_ project.

As we began to amble through the courtyard with our eyes still wide with wonder, I spotted an old fence hidden away by the bushes. Without wasting any time, I wandered over to it to see if anything interesting was in that corner - it looked pretty desolate, but I couldn’t help but feel drawn to its air of mystery. Soon after we arrived at the rusty fence, we came face-to-face with another stunning view that left both of us completely slack-jawed.

A glistening lake stretched out in front of us with a tiny island floating gracefully in the centre of it. The island in question couldn’t have been more than about 4 metres wide, but still overflowed with gorgeous greenery and vines that spiralled out in all directions. But it was what lay in the centre of the island that struck me with awe. A single solitary flower peeked its head timidly out from amongst the shrubbery and fern that surrounded it; a dazzling blush of burgundy within a cage of green.

Sugino handed my phone back without a word, and seemed to be in some sort of trance - honestly, I think that I was experiencing the same odd wave of tranquillity. I raised my phone and took a few photos of this rare and serene sight before me, making sure to capture the true elegance of the whole view. Even though the landscape didn’t explicitly evoke the theme of ‘emotions’, it quelled something deep inside me and I had to capture the moment. In any case, I may be commended for ‘thinking outside the box’.

After that, time went pretty quickly as Sugino and I wandered through the rest of town, taking it in turns to take photos of whatever took our fancy. Eventually it was lunch time and we decided to meet up with the others to go and buy something from a local cafe. It only took a couple of minutes to run into Kayano and Ritsu, and they seemed enthusiastic about our plans for getting food. Apparently there was a small cafe near the bus stop, so we headed over there immediately - after all, our stomachs were rumbling pretty loudly.

Once we arrived at the quaint little cottage, we were pretty hungry and rushed inside to find a table. As soon as we entered though, my good mood was instantly gone and a frown weaved its way onto my face. A certain redhead was perched up on one of the stools near the bar (despite clearly being underage) with Isogai next to him chatting intently about something or other. Surprisingly enough, Karma actually looked interested in what he was saying, but promptly turned his head towards the door at the sound of the bell signalling our entrance. Kayano’s face instantly brightened and she merrily skipped over to where the others were sitting.

“Hey guys! What a pleasure to see you here,” Karma declared, his voice uncharacteristically velvety and soothing. For a minute, I was mildly taken aback by his warm greeting, and I couldn’t decipher if he was being genuinely friendly or if it was just another one of his acts - I mentally shrugged when I couldn’t work it out, but decided that I was happy as long as he was treating my friends nicely.

Surprising everyone, I calmly walked over to the bar stools and sat down next to Karma, flashing him a charming smile that spread from the corners of my lips to the edges of my eyes. Yeah, yeah I know what you’re thinking: Nagisa, why are you acting so friendly and amicable towards this absolute douche-bag? Well my friends, let me tell you.

When Karma had turned around, his eyes lit up - granted, it was very subtle, but I tend to notice the little things about people. Anyway, even the best of actors can’t fake that slight twinkle in their eyes when they are honestly happy to see someone. And in that moment, I realised that I had been wrong to judge Karma; I think that we had simply met in the worst of circumstances, and neither of us had bothered to get to know the other.

I know that we had only known each other for a very short amount of time, but in that time I had never once said a nice thing to him. I never wanted to smile when he was around. I didn’t want to show any weakness. From the minute I saw him, I had immediately thrown up a shield to protect myself; a shield that consisted of insults, sarcasm and hatred. I realised that the person I was when I was around him just wasn’t the real me - it was all an act, a facade created to keep him from invading my life.

In fact, the truth is that I was scared of letting him in. Ever wondered why my friendship group is so small? I have major trust issues. Ever since my dad left, I think that something in the back of my mind decided to shut everyone out, to never trust anyone ever again. Because at the root of all my problems, I’m absolutely terrified of people leaving me.

“Nagisa…?” A soft voice cut through my thoughts, and I suddenly realised that my vision was blurry. I blinked rapidly and quickly scrambled off the stool I was sitting on, before running out of the cafe. As soon as I had exited the building, I was hit with a refreshing breeze. I didn’t slow down though, and kept on racing through the winding streets of the town that suddenly felt too small and almost claustrophobic. I couldn’t hold my emotions back anymore, so the tears finally started streaming down my face and my legs pumped even faster so that I was now full-on sprinting.

I somehow made my way back to the peaceful courtyard from earlier - it was as if my legs knew where I wanted to be. As I reached the fence preventing me from running any further, I collapsed to the floor with my body facing the sparkling lake; it was an odd comfort, and it somehow made me feel less alone.

As soon as that thought crossed my mind though, another wave of illogical anguish hit me and my whole body shook with the sobs that I tried so hard to suppress. In an attempt to muffle my cries, I clutched my legs to my chest and hid my head completely, trying to make myself as small as possible - I don’t know why, but in the moment I wanted to blend into my surroundings and just disappear.

I don’t know how much time passed; it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes, but it felt like much longer. I guess time passes differently when you feel so helpless and alone. Anyway, after god knows how long, I suddenly felt a presence behind me. I didn’t lift my head though (as I knew that I must look like an absolute wreck), and I most certainly didn’t trust my shaky voice to work - so I just sat there, probably looking completely pathetic with a potential stranger watching me.

A quiet rustle came from behind me and I was half-tempted to look, but completely froze when a gentle hand rested on my back in a comforting gesture. I knew that I still looked awful, but I needed to know who was behind me, so I slowly raised my head and turned to see who was beside me. My eyes widened in shock and my body tensed when I saw who it was: the last person that I expected to come after me. Those unique golden eyes were trained on the picturesque sight before us, and his expression was one that I had never seen on his face before; it was a strange mixture of contentedness, concern and something else that I couldn’t quite place.

“Karma…?” I whispered, wincing at how husky my voice sounded. Instead of replying, Karma simply kept on staring forward with his hand still rested on my back - he didn’t need to say anything though, as his actions spoke to me louder than any words could. But what did he want? Still feeling fragile and unsure, I started to tear up again. Why was he here? Was he going to leave? Trying rather unsuccessfully to hold back my tears, I choked something out before my throat could close up again.

“Please don’t leave me.”

Once again, I buried my head in my legs, no longer caring how weak or vulnerable I looked. Karma remained silent, but shuffled a bit closer in response; I couldn’t even express how grateful I was, so I decided to just let my feelings out in a torrent of emotional sobbing.

My tears soon subsided, and I lifted my head to wipe my eyes and turn towards the boy next to me. In response, he turned his whole body to face me and gently removed his hand from my back. Instead of talking though, he simply waited for me to start the conversation.

“I’m sorry,” I began, my voice still slightly hoarse from my multiple breakdowns. Karma shook his head and gave me a look that almost looked guilty.

“No, no, this isn’t your fault!” I reassured, waving my hands to try and emphasise my sincerity.

“I just… I think that I finally came to terms with something that I’ve kept buried for many years.” I hung my head in preparation to explain myself, but was interrupted by Karma for the first time since he arrived here.

“You don’t have to explain yourself,” he reassured, “but I need to make something clear.” It was odd seeing Karma like this; he was being so calm and gentle to try and console my nervous state, and I realised once again that I had been so wrong about him this entire time. Sure, he had been a real douche when we first met, but that was no excuse for me to retaliate in the way I did. I couldn’t help but think how much time we must have wasted on pointless rivalry.

“Everyone’s so worried about you, Nagisa. The others didn’t know what to do when you left the way you did, and were too shocked to do anything about it - you’ve never showed them that side of you, right?” I shook my head in response, refusing to let myself tear up again.

“Sorry it was me that found you. I know you would rather have been found by one of your friends, but I guess I got to you first.” He chuckled humourlessly at that, but before I had time to correct him, a distant shout came from somewhere behind us.

Karma’s head jerked upwards and he shot up from the ground, before suddenly running off without a moment’s hesitation. My brows furrowed in confusion and I slowly rose to my feet to see where he was running off to; but he was already gone. Before I had time to think about Karma’s sudden disappearance, I heard another shout as Sugino came rushing into the courtyard, his face slightly flushed. As soon as he saw me, his face lit up and he dashed towards me with renewed energy.

“Dude! Thank god we finally found you - the bus is gonna leave in like 5 minutes!” He exclaimed, making wild gestures with his arms to emphasise the urgency of his message. I nodded quickly and jogged alongside him back to the bus stop where our bus had just pulled up.

We ran onto the bus and plonked down on some empty seats near the back of the vehicle, before the doors promptly shut behind us. Breathing heavily, I noticed that a couple of random people as well as some of our classmates were sending us disapproving looks - I really didn’t care though, as we successfully avoided being stranded in some old town in the middle of nowhere. A small smile danced on my lips as I rested my head back onto the headrest and closed my eyes in contented victory.

Before I could relax, I felt someone poking my arm and opened one eye lazily to see who had disturbed me. My eyes narrowed slightly as I saw Terasaka in the seat in front of me, looking back at me with irritation clear in his pale green eyes.

“Oi, don’t look at me like that,” he grumbled. “I’ve been told to give you this.” He dropped what looked like a small package into my lap and swiftly turned back around. I picked up the box-like thing with hesitation, but my curiosity got the better of me and I ripped it open. Inside the package was a small, delicate strawberry tart, with some kind of flower used as a garnish. My stomach growled in response to the food, and I was about to tuck in before Sugino looked over and stopped me in my tracks.

“Dude, do you know what this means?” Confused as to what he meant, I lifted an eyebrow as an indication for him to continue.

“Damn, I thought this was common knowledge - you really don’t know?” The astonishment was evident in his voice, but I genuinely had no idea what he was talking about.

“Erm, someone knew that I hadn’t eaten any lunch?” I suggested, but his deadpan expression told me that my idea was totally wrong.

“In that case, don’t think that I should be the one to tell you. But I’ll give you a hint: that flower means something.”

And with that, he turned around to talk to Isogai and some other guys that were sitting behind us. For a brief moment, I stared out of the window going over everything in my head. Terasaka said that ‘someone’ wanted him to give the box to me, so I have no idea who this is from. I didn’t want to ask anyone else in case it turned out to be embarrassing.

Urgh, what the hell is going on?  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading and being patient with my long break from AO3. I can't promise that updates will be super regular, but I'll try my hardest! Anyways, are any of you guys going to London Comic Con this month? I'm SUPER excited for it, and wondered if any of you guys are coming too?  
> Also I really want to know if you guys are ready for the friendship to begin? Or do you want more angst? I'd really like your opinions, so please let me know!  
> ★-(,,･ε´-,,)⌒☆ x


	6. Carnation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I just wanted to say that Nagisa's mum is going to be nice in this fic, so there's that... Anyways, as always I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Okay, so let’s go over the basics: 

  1. Some anonymous person has given me a delicious-looking strawberry tart with some sort of flower on top 
  2. Sugino knows what’s up with that
  3. He won’t tell me
  4. I have no idea what’s going on



Tch, this mystery won’t get the best of me! I’ve watched all the Sherlock Holmes movies  _ and _ the whole TV series! I’m practically a detective! 

Ah I’m getting distracted - come on, focus on the task at hand! So first things first, we need to talk to any potential witnesses. As I engaged detective-mode, my face smoothed over and my eyes drifted towards Terasaka; I can’t alert him of my suspicions yet, so I’ll have to appear casual.

“Hey, Terasaka,” I began, and luckily he heard me.

“Hm?” Phew, at least he’s in a slightly better mood now. Phase 2 of interrogation,  _ go _ ! 

“I was just wondering who gave you this box earlier,” I said, indicating the package in my hands to clarify what I meant. “I’m really grateful for it, and I would love to thank them in person!”  Aw yeah, he’ll never suspect a thing - I’m such a pro!

“Sorry man, I just passed it back to you from someone else,” he finished, turning back around to resume his previous conversation with his friends. Damn, I almost had some decent intel. Oh well, any good detective will never give up after just one enquiry; let’s get to the bottom of this myst–

A hand on my arm suddenly pulled me out of my internal monologue, and I turned to see that it was Sugino. My chipper mood faltered when I saw his expression of worry and uncertainty. Oh god, what’s happened?

“What’s wrong?” I prompted when he didn’t say anything. I was getting really worried now, had I done something wrong? Was he mad at me?!

“Sorry for how I behaved earlier - but I think you’ll understand when you see this.” He quickly passed me his phone and I looked at screen to see what he wanted to show me. My pupils dilated slightly when I finally registered what I was looking at. At the top of the webpage was an image of the same flower that was on my mini strawberry tart, and only when I registered the connection did I read the title below the image: ‘Meaning & Symbolism of Carnations’.

I slowly looked back up to meet the intense stare of my friend beside me. He nodded firmly for me to continue reading, and I hesitantly returned my gaze back to the screen. Do I even want to know this? Judging from how Sugino was acting, I wasn’t sure. Regardless though, I dragged my eyes across the text in front of me, not really taking in what this was all supposed to mean. A few phrases stood out, especially the one stating that  ‘virtually every colour carries a unique and rich association’. Briefly glancing back down to the box in my lap, I noticed that my flower was a rich crimson colour. Oh god, I really don’t want to know what it means; but I couldn’t stop myself now.

As I kept on reading about mythology and the origin of the word, I finally came to the last paragraph that I think Sugino wanted me to read. A deep feeling of dread began to manifest in my chest, but I kept going nevertheless.

‘White carnations suggest pure love and good luck, whereas light red symbolises admiration. Purple carnations imply capriciousness, and pink carnations symbolise a mother’s undying love.’

At this point, I felt physically sick. I couldn’t even register all the emotions and thoughts going around in my head. And then I read it.

‘Finally, dark red carnations represent deep love and affection.’

There it was. The bombshell finally dropped. I lifted my head and stared blankly at Sugino, not bothering to open my mouth as I knew I would be completely speechless. He soon realised that I wasn’t going to be speaking any time soon, so he took the liberty of making the situation 100% clear to me. A cheeky smirk started to twitch at the corners of his lips, before he started talking.

“Nagisa, you have a secret admirer!” He exclaimed, and that was enough to snap me out of my trance. I slapped my hands over his mouth to stop him from shouting anything more, heat burning at my cheeks as I frantically looked around to see if anyone had heard. Thankfully, no-one was looking in our direction, so I assumed that I was safe. After exhaling deeply, I released Sugino and slumped back into my seat, a blush still staining my face. Sugino looked like he was having the time of his life though, with a big dopey grin threatening to split his face.

“You totally fell for my serious act! I must be such a good actor! Anyways, all joking aside - who do you think it is? Who do you want it to be?” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively as he impatiently waited for me to answer. I simply gave him an incredulous look and shrugged my shoulders lazily.

“I have no idea - it must be a prank though, right? Or some kind of coincidence? Hang on a minute, how did you know what the flower meant in the first place?” Sugino suddenly looked rather shy, but a small smile still tugged at his lips.

“I looked into it for Kanzaki. I wanted to show her my feelings, you know? Anyway, I just came across these flowers during my research,” he finished with his regular grin plastered on his face, looking rather proud of himself. I nodded at his reasoning, and turned back towards the window.

After a few minutes of daydreaming, I realised that the bus was approaching its stop right outside our school. As the bus came to a halt, our class filed out the door and started the short walk back to the art studio. I couldn’t help but feel oddly content - after all, a massive weight had just been lifted of my shoulders, and I felt as if I could finally start to accept who I truly was instead of denying what I already knew to be true. I just wish I didn’t have to have a massive breakdown to realise it.

After we had all arrived in the classroom and taken our seats, Mr Karasuma gave us a stern look to make us quieten down before he began to speak.

“Well done for all behaving well today, and I hope that you took lots of good photos to go in your art journal.” Some people’s faces paled at that, clearly not having realised that this trip would actually be important - it was their faults really, as Mr Karasuma had obviously said that this would be part of our project. “Anyway,” he continued, “it’s nearly the end of the day, so please calmly form a line and show me your submission for the photo competition.”

The chairs all scraped the floor simultaneously as we all not-so-calmly scrambled to get to the front of the line; though after one dangerous look from our teacher, everyone immediately stopped pushing and formed a neat line of pairs in record time. Sugino and I were near the back of the line, but I didn’t really care since our photo would be seen eventually. Silently, we flicked through all the potential photos that we could submit, but soon chose the perfect one that we both 100% agreed on. 

As Mr Karasuma went through the photos, we were all amazed that he actually had a keen eye for detail, and interpreted each photo in a way that was impressively astute and insightful. From what I could tell, nothing had really stood out yet - to be honest though, I’m not too fussed about this competition. For me, this whole trip has given me such insight into myself as well as other people, and I now feel as if I don’t need my mask anymore. Sure, I’m not ready to go shouting from the rooftops, but I’m happy that I’ve finally acknowledged and embraced who I truly am.

When Karma’s name was called, I started to pay a bit more attention to what was going on. I actually had no idea what sort of photo he would select, nor what type of emotion he would choose. As he and Isogai walked away from the teacher afterwards, I caught a glimpse of the photo in Karma’s hand - I was more than mildly taken aback when I saw that he was holding a polaroid image. Huh, I didn’t think that Karma was the sort of person to carry one of those cameras around. Anyway, from what I could gather about it, the photo depicted an elderly couple walking arm-in-arm down the street. The subject matter was clearly love; it was not an emotion that I thought Karma would choose...

“Nagisa and Sugino, you’re up.” I suddenly zoned back in and realised that I was at the front of the line with the teacher waiting expectantly for our photo submission. I unlocked my phone quickly and passed him the photo. After a moment of staring intently at my screen, Mr Karasuma raised his head and gave a long, hard stare. What? Was our photo not good enough? Did it not fit the criteria?

“This photo… it’s absolutely stunning. Which one of you took it?” Still in mild shock at his obvious praise, I lifted my hand after glancing at Sugino with an air of uncertainty.  “What I love about this photo is that the emotions are so implicit, you have to really put yourself in the shoes of the photographer. It’s clear that you felt a connection to this scene in front of you, and I have to congratulate you on the unorthodox subject choice. Okay, next!” I turned to face Sugino after we moved out of the line, and he flashed me a thumbs-up and a toothy grin that was infectious. 

After everyone’s photos had been critiqued, Mr Karasuma cleared his throat to direct our attention to the front of the classroom. The final bell was due to ring in a couple of minutes, so our teacher just cut to the chase and told us all what we were dying to know.

“I just want to emphasise that everyone had great photos today, and there was not a single bad photo - but as we all know, there can only be one winner. Congratulations to our winners Nagisa and Sugino!” Everyone broke into applause and quickly swarmed us, wanting to take a glimpse of the winning photo. I couldn’t believe that our photo had won! Yes! This day had (very fittingly) been full of emotions, and I was glad that it finished on such a positive note. 

I took another look down at my photo, a winning photo, and smiled. I truly loved this photo. That small island symbolised so much for me, and the little flower that sat in the middle gave me hope for the future. 

The bell signalling the end of the day finally rang, and everyone left the room chattering happily with no harsh feelings about the competition - that was why I loved my class, everyone was so understanding and never get annoyed when they didn’t win. I was about to leave the room along with everyone else, when I remembered my after-school arrangement. Oh well. It could be worse.

I looked around the room in search for a certain redhead, but frowned when I saw no sign of him anywhere. Did he forget and go home? I bet he’s just already gone to the drama studio. Yep. With my mind made up, I sallied forth to the drama room with confidence in my stride and a smile on my face.

As I approached the room however, I heard voices coming from inside. I couldn’t quite decipher who they belonged to, but they kinda sounded familiar… I was torn between not wanting to eavesdrop and not wanting to go in, but in the end I knocked gently on one of the doors and entered the room. To my astonishment, Sugino, Ritsu and Kayano were all gathered inside; not only that, but they clearly talking about something important to Karma. They obviously hadn’t noticed that I had entered the room, so I dropped my bag loudly on the floor - it announced my arrival quite nicely, but the sudden noise drew a scream from Ritsu and several gasps from the others. Wait a second, why do they look guilty…?

“Well, sorry to interrupt your rehearsal boys! See you tomorrow!” Kayano declared in a rather high-pitched voice before scurrying out of the door, closely followed by Sugino and Ritsu. I shot a questioning look towards Karma, but he simply cleared his throat and pulled a DVD case out of his bag.

“So the plan was just to watch a movie today, right? Are you still okay with that?” I nodded and sat down on one of the beanbags that are usually left in the corner of the room, before simply waiting for Karma to stick the movie into the film slot of the TV - Korosensei had begged the school board to give him the funds to buy one, and after half a year of constant nagging, they finally gave in. After the movie was in its slot and running, Karma silently pulled up a beanbag next to mine and flopped down in it with a huff. He was acting kinda weird, but I didn’t press him just in case he didn’t want to tell me about it. 

The movie was called ‘The Bourne Identity’, and it was actually pretty good. After a solid 2 hours of action-packed goodness, the credits started to roll and I took that as my cue to head home. I left Karma to pack his stuff up himself, as I got the impression that he didn’t really want to stay and chat.

“See ya then,” I called over my shoulder and left the room to begin the journey home. It only took about 15 minutes to reach my front door, and when I entered my house I was hit by a wonderful smell coming from the kitchen. After greeting my mum, I told her all about my great day. When I got to the bit about winning the photo competition, she hugged me tightly and asked to see the picture. She was taken aback when I showed her, and started gushing about how good it was. I blushed and smiled at her praise, feeling very humble about my photo.

“Ooh and the flower is absolutely stunning! That deep red colour is so beautiful - and it’s my favourite type of flower!” As soon as she said that, I tried to look closely at what flower it was, and realised that it looked quite familiar, but I couldn’t quite place where I’d seen it before. I quickly gave up and asked her what it was.

“Why, I thought I’d told you this already? It’s a carnation!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I say this every week and will keep doing so, but I really appreciate getting feedback from you guys - after all, this fic is for all of us, so I want to get it right! Love you all, see you next week! ^_^ x


	7. Mood Swings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a bit of weird chapter, this one. It's kinda a filler chapter, but don't worry - there will be some real plot in the next one! I'll probably edit this at a later date, but I really wanted to just get this one out for you on time. Hope you enjoy!

The rest of the week went by rather uneventfully, and I spent most of my time thinking about that damn carnation - I know I shouldn’t have wasted my time thinking so deeply about it, but the whole situation was just a bit weird, right? I mean, how could someone have coincidentally bought me a strawberry tart (which I thoroughly enjoyed the evening I received it) with the same flower that was on that tiny island in the middle of nowhere? As far as I knew, only three people had seen that island: Me, Sugino and Karma. And yet, my supposed ‘secret admirer’ had known that this flower really meant something to me - admittedly, I was a bit disturbed when I had first found out the connection, but I soon decided that I shouldn’t let it bother me. After all, they may not have even known the true meaning of the flower; not everyone was fluent in flower-language like Sugino was.

Soon enough, Friday rolled around and the whole school was excited for the weekend. For me, I had a great day of lessons that didn’t require much effort at all, including double drama; that’s right, this insecure, nervous introvert was looking forward to two whole hours of being stuck in a room with overactive, loud teens. Actually that makes it sound awful, but after the many revelations I’d had this week, I was determined to face my problems head-on.

Speaking of problems, my main issue this week concerned Karma - after witnessing my breakdown on the art trip he’d been acting really weird toward me, and I hated this feeling of uncertainty as to why he was acting this way. Instead of letting it stew inside me though, I made a plan of attack: corner and confront. That way, he could get whatever it was off his chest, and I’d stop thinking about it all the time; it was a win win situation!

With an air of determination in my stride, I opened the double doors leading into the drama studio and resolutely looked around for my target. A bright flash of red crossed my vision and I immediately headed in that direction, still adamant to clear up whatever this situation was. As I neared the corner of the room, the redhead that I’d been searching for slowly came into view, and my plan slowly began to crumble as I let nerves get the better of me. As I came to a halt in front of him, Karma raised his head from the script that he was reading and gave me a deadpan look.

I swallowed hard, trying to get my voice to work. Damn, he was so intimidating! After a minute of just standing there like an absolute lemon, Karma turned away with a bored sigh and resumed the reading of his lines. Okay, I think it’s time to change my plans a bit; at this rate, I’ll never be able to confront him.

Instead of wasting more time formulating another plan though, I decided that I should actually get on and do some work. After pulling a copy of the script from my bag, I wandered over to my friends to see what they were getting up to - Korosensei had already assigned all of the roles, but I had yet to find out who was playing who.

“Hey,” I greeted with a casual wave. The others all turned to face me with strange looks on their faces - Sugino flashed me a weak smile while the other two tried (and failed) to look happy to see me. A perturbed look wormed its way onto my face; what’s wrong? A million different thoughts ran around in my mind, mostly about what could reduce my usually-cheery friends to such a melancholy state. Jesus, what was wrong with people today? Why didn’t anyone want to talk to me? I mean sure, I could kinda understand why Karma didn’t seem enthusiastic about my presence, but my best friends? They were only people in the world who I tell everything to. The only ones that I completely trust.

I guess it’s because they’ve been with me from the beginning. They helped me when I was having issues with my mum, they offered me a place to stay when my dad left home, and they know all of my deepest secrets that I would never tell  _ anyone _ else. I just couldn’t understand why they were acting so weird - I may seem like I was over-reacting, but you need to understand that my friends have never acted this way, never kept something from me.

Before my thought could get any darker, I turned away from them and slowly wandered back over to the only other person that had helped me before. When Karma saw me approaching, his eyes widened fractionally as he took in my vacant expression. Clearing his throat, he began speaking in very calm and clear voice, obviously trying not to exacerbate the situation - something that I was actually grateful for.

“So, do you want to go over some of the lines? I think we need to learn this bit together to get the pacing right.” That made a small smile tug at my lips; at least I’d found a way to make Karma serious. I gave a slight nod in reply, and immediately Karma’s whole posture relaxed. Heh, I bet he was scared that I was gonna shout at him or something.

We practised for about 30 minutes on the scene just before the one that we used for our auditions; at least this time around, we both put in much more effort into nailing the performance. I tried extra hard today solely to take my mind off my friends’ strange mood, but I think that Karma only tried harder to maintain his title as the best actor in the class. Tch. He really was the same asshole that I’d met in the rain…

“Right, so this bit here’s where you walk off with the Turkish ambassador.” When I zoned back into what was going on around me, Karma had moved around to stand next to me and was pointing out a certain place in the script.

“Y-Yeah,” I muttered, feeling slightly uncomfortable at my close proximity with the redhead. What else did he want me to say? The damn thing was written on the script…

“Okay I’m just gonna come out and say it. What’s with you today? It’s like you’re deliberately trying to piss me off.” I turned to face Karma head-on with a bitter scowl on my face.

“Do you know what Karma, I don’t know what the hell your problem is. One minute you act all nice-guy, another minute you’re an insensitive bastard and the rest of the time I don’t even know who you are. Which, to be honest, I’d be totally fine with if you just left me the fuck alone and minded your own damn business. I’m sick of all these shitty facades you’ve created! Why can’t you just freaking chose a personality?! Oh, and don’t think I’ve forgotten what happened last week. What was that whole ‘I’m so sorry I found you, oh I’m so rubbish, oh pity me’ thing? If you were fucking playing with my feelings and making fun of me, you can seriously just go and fuck yourself!” 

I was panting slightly by the end of my rant, but managed to maintain my cold exterior. It was time to get some answers about this, and I wasn’t going to back down again. Karma’s expression didn’t change one bit throughout my tirade (which I admit was a bit too much). At least the rest of the class hadn’t appeared to have heard...

“Are you quite done?” he asked, his voice dangerously low. Okay, I had definitely gone too far. Oh god, pray for my soul. I stared blankly back at him, completely suffocated by his overpowering aura. Instead of talking any more though, he gripped my arm firmly (though not painfully, thank god) and dragged me out of the studio. Luckily Korosensei didn’t see us; if he had, he would have wanted a detailed explanation, and I really wasn’t ready to give him one.

After pacing through the corridors for a bit, Karma suddenly shoved me into a room. I let out a yelp of surprise and almost landed on the floor; I probably would have done if a bench weren’t there to break my fall. Immediately after he’d pushed me into what I realised was the boys’ locker room, Karma also entered the room and sat down on the bench next to me, before simply staring into my eyes - I assumed he was waiting for me to speak first, but I had no idea what to say.

“Sorry about what I said,” I eventually let out in a timid voice. To my surprise, Karma simply returned a tender smile and gave a deep sigh.

“To be perfectly honest, I don’t blame you for what you said. In fact, I was kinda waiting for you to snap after what happened on the art trip.” I blinked owlishly at that; wasn’t he supposed to be mad at me?

“That’s why I brought you here. So, ask me whatever you want. I promise I’ll answer honestly.” Still taken aback by his oddly-understanding behaviour, it took me awhile to get my head around what he’d said before I could finally articulate a response.

“Anything? Why?” I pondered out loud, and Karma nodded sincerely. He conveniently ignored my second question, so I just decided to obey and began to question the boy in front of me.

“Umm so I guess my main question is... Why have you been acting so weird to me since the art trip? I mean, it’s not like I expected you to stay with me or anything, and that’s not the problem; in fact, I totally don’t mind, it’s just–” Karma cut off my rambling by raising his hand - something that I was glad for, as who knows how long I would have babbled on for.

“Don’t worry - I said I’d answer any question, right?” Karma reassured, a charming smile plastered on his face as he spoke. “Okay, so let me explain.” He breathed in deeply before talking again.

“When I found you in that courtyard, I honestly didn’t know what to do; in fact, I was almost tempted to just turn away and tell your friends where you were. But it was like something inside me knew that they wouldn’t find you… I don’t know, I just felt like in that moment, all you needed was someone there with you, and it didn’t really matter who it was. Before I could convince myself to turn away, I found myself sat down next to you - yeah it sounds cheesy, but I feel like you deserve to know the whole story.” When he finished, I actually didn’t know what to say without sounding like a complete idiot. What could I even say to that? Before I could try and formulate some kind of response, Karma started speaking again.

“I’m guessing your next question will be about why I ran away when I heard that shout, so I’ll just answer that one now. If I’m being totally honest, I didn’t want anyone to see me like that - it’s stupid and it’s cruel, but I didn’t want people to see that side of me. I felt as if I had to maintain my image. Some things have changed since then, and I know that what I thought was wrong; but it still happened, and I want you to know the truth.” 

Well, he really didn’t sugar-coat things did he? That was actually really cold… Before, I could think too deeply about that though, I simply decided what to ask Karma next. It was the question that had been running around my mind all week, and I needed to know the answer.

“Do you know anything about carnations?”

“Huh?” Karma looked slightly confused, so I clarified what I meant.

“Someone bought me a strawberry tart when we were on the art trip, and it had some kind of flower on it - a carnation, actually. Do you… know anything about that?” I finished timidly, suddenly feeling self conscious of my question. God, why did I even ask that? Severely regretting my decision to bring that subject up, I hung my head as I felt my cheeks start to burn.

“Sorry… I don’t know anything about that…” I squeezed my eyes closed, now feeling like an absolute idiot. Tch, of course he didn’t know anything about that stupid flower - why did I even think that he did? Karma was looking away from me when I finally opened my eyes again, but I was too embarrassed to try and get his attention.

“So, is that all?” he finally asked, cutting through the silence with his sharp tone. I nodded dumbly in reply. A wary smile surfaced on Karma’s lips for a millisecond, before he stood up and walked out of the locker room and (presumably) back to the drama studio. I exhaled a long breath that I didn’t know I was holding, and eventually made up my mind to follow the boy; after all, I couldn’t afford to bunk off drama, especially since I was the one of the main roles. Tch, I still couldn’t believe that I could say that. If you’d told me a week ago that I’d be memorising lines for one of the main roles in the school play, I probably would have laughed in your face. 

My legs seemed to have taken me all the way to the drama studio doors by the time I’d finished daydreaming. With a final sigh, I opened the doors and strolled back into the room that I spent most of my time in now. No one seemed to notice my arrival, but before I could feel too salty about that, I heard a voice call from somewhere near the back of the room.

“Hey Nagisa, I’m over here!” Looking around confusedly, my eyes finally landed on the redhead that I’d been talking to mere minutes ago; and he was waving rather oddly at me. Arching an eyebrow, I sauntered over to where he was perched on a comfy-looking armchair looking rather pleased with himself.

“Sorry about just now, I must’ve had a major mood-swing. Crazy huh?” he chortled. Still feeling perplexed about his unexpectedly-happy behaviour I shrugged my shoulders and gave a small nod. Karma seemed happy with my response though, as his goofy grin only grew wider as he clapped his hands together in an exuberant gesture.

“Lovely! So I guess this is a truce then? Ah, that’s such a weight off my shoulders. Anyway, let’s not waste any more time and get on with our rehearsal!” I still had no idea what had come over Karma, but I decided to take advantage of this rare mood of his and just go along with it. A small but genuine smile broke out on my lips as I picked up my script from the floor and flicked to the page that we were going through earlier.

I couldn’t quite believe it, but we were actually really productive throughout the next hour; it was shocking how well we got on, but I decided that I preferred it this way. Sure, we squabbled a bit from time to time, but it was only over tiny things such as the way we should put emphasis on certain words and not others.  As we approached the end of the lesson, my mood was significantly higher than usual - and I also had a plan.

“Karma?” I interjected as we were reading through the next part of the script. He tilted his head to the side to let me know that he was listening.

“I know we usually meet up here after school, but it’s kinda interfering with my homework. So… do you mind if we practise at my house? It’s just that way we can both get on with work at the same time.” Oh yeah, bonus points to me for not stuttering or making myself look like an idiot! I know, that proposal was kinda out of the blue, but I feel like all the tension between us has gone. If I’m going to be perfectly honest, I think that if we don’t make an effort to keep it that way, this peace will soon be disturbed. A glint appeared in Karma’s eyes as he turned towards me - it could have been my imagination, but I swear I saw the corners of his mouth start to twitch upwards just before he spoke.

“Yeah, I’d lik– I mean, I think that’s a sensible idea. Meet me by the gates after school then.” And with that, the perfectly-timed bell rang and Karma walked off to his next lesson after a small wave of his hand.

Not going to lie, the rest of the day dragged on for so long. At lunchtime, my friends seemed to be in a normal mood again, but they didn’t really talk to me. I tried not to read into it too much (because it would probably put me in a really bad mood), so I just dropped the issue. After what seemed like an eternity, the final bell rang and I raced out of math class towards the school gates. No, I was definitely  _ not _ excited for what was going to happen after school. I just really wanted to get out math class… 

I quickly came to a stop outside the school gates and looked around briefly for Karma - he wasn’t too hard to spot him with his flame-red hair. After a few brief greetings, we started walking down the road relatively quickly so that we could get as much stuff done as possible. We made small talk for a while, but quickly decided that we were just as comfortable in the peaceful silence between us. I just hoped that this tranquility would last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who do you guys think the carnation is from? Should it be from a rival love interest? I'd love to get your feedback, as I actually haven't made up my mind yet. Anyways, thanks for reading! See you next week! x


	8. Ding Dong

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! Finally! Sorry for the massive hiatus I've been on, but life got in the way and I had 0 inspiration to write. Sorry if this isn't my best writing, but I just needed to get back into the swing of things after 2 months of no writing! Hopefully I can get a few chapters written in the holidays, and I promise they will actually have a plot - anyways, hope you enjoy this little filler chapter!

It only took around 20 minutes to arrive at my front door. I made sure to unlock the door very quietly, as I knew that if my mum saw Karma, she would probably freak out; yeah, I’ve had the same group of friends for most of my life, and even then I rarely bring them back to my house. As we walked through the door, I heard the dreaded sound of my mum walking down the stairs. It was too late to make an escape though, so I simply braced myself for whatever was coming - if my past experiences were anything to go on, she would completely spoil the guest and (more often than not) be so overpowering that said guest would not want to return. Don’t get me wrong, my mum was actually rather accommodating and friendly, but I think that she just gets a bit too enthusiastic at the prospect of me actually having friends.

I did feel slightly sorry for Karma, though. He had no idea what was coming or why I was acting so nervous. As my mum reached the bottom of the stairs, she turned towards the door to welcome me home like she usually did; but when she saw Karma, her eyes widened in almost comical excitement and a bright grin lit up her face.

“Well, isn’t this a pleasant surprise! Who’s our guest, Nagisa?” Before I could open my mouth to answer her, Karma began to speak.

“Hello Mrs Shiota, it’s lovely to meet you! My name’s Karma Akabane,” he replied in a rather mellifluous and confident manner - I was actually kinda surprised at how courteous he was being. My mum was certainly pleased though, as her face threatened to split with her smile.

“It’s been a while since Nagisa’s had a friend over, I’m so glad you agreed to come. If you need anything at all, I’ll just be downstairs!” I could feel my face start to flush, so I just walked swiftly past my still-grinning mother, before quickly making my way up to my bedroom. Luckily I heard a hesitant pair of footsteps behind me, so at least I knew that Karma was following me and I wouldn’t have to go back to get him.

My bedroom was directly to the left of the stairs, so when I reached the top of them I turned sharply and pushed my door open. I could still feel a slight blush on my cheeks as I entered the room, so I pressed my hands to my face in hopes that the redness would dissipate before Karma came in. While I was busy worrying about the state of my face, I had actually failed to notice that a certain redhead had already entered my room, with my back conveniently turned away from the door.

Suddenly, I felt slender fingers creep around my torso and swiftly pinch my waist - without any warning, I let out a shrill squeal and spun around, completely taken aback by the sudden action.

“What the hell was that for?” I demanded, my voice rather embarrassingly high-pitched. Karma simply chuckled in response and shrugged one shoulder in a vague gesture, while he proceeded to look around my room and pick up random things lying around. Thank god, I thought he’d realised… Wait, maybe he was playing me? Did he actually do that on purpose? I swear to god, if he ever found out that I was ticklish, I would _never_ hear the end of it.

“So, what do you want to do?” I ventured, trying to break the silence and hopefully get Karma to stop nosing through all of my things; after all, I was worried that I’d accidentally left something embarrassing out. It was unlikely, but I still couldn’t help feeling paranoid when someone was snooping around and practically analysing my possessions. Again, Karma gave a noncommittal sound, prompting me to roll my eyes in annoyance. I snatched some sort of book that Karma was currently staring at out of his hands and glared him, the slight scowl on my face soon mirrored by the face in front of me.

“What?” he questioned, as his frown quickly dissolved into a look of worry. I sighed deeply before just shaking my head and putting the book in my hands (I vaguely registered that it was one of my favourite Sherlock Holmes books) back down on my desk.

“Nothing, don’t worry about it,” I reassured. “So, do you want to practise some lines?”

“Actually I kinda need to get some work done first,” Karma replied, looking around for (what I assumed was) a place to do so. I inwardly grimaced at his words - right after I had suggested doing work earlier, I had instantly regretted it and had just hoped that he’d forgotten. Yeah, I’d realised that if he took me up on that offer, he would stay over for god knows how long, and to be perfectly honest I really didn’t want him staying over much longer than necessary. But ever the polite host I was, I simply nodded in a friendly manner.

“Sure, I guess you can sit wherever. I don’t really mind.” Karma flashed me a brief but slightly awkward smile, and settled himself on my floor before spreading his work out in front of him. I huffed slightly before deciding to join him; after all, we shared most of our classes so maybe doing homework together would get it done quicker. I reached into my bag and pulled out all of my books and supplies onto the floor, the loud noise causing the redhead to jump slightly. He tried to pretend like nothing had happened, and that earned a tiny smile of triumph from me, slightly pleased that I’d finally gained the upper hand for once.

After recovering from my mini mental celebration, I noticed that Karma was working on some maths questions from the textbook. I inwardly groaned at just the sight of all those numbers, but I figured that if I did that homework now, then I could just copy the other boy’s answers. I know it sounds bad, but I really wasn’t in the mood for simultaneous equations

Casually sitting on the floor so that I could read Karma’s work, I laid down my textbook and flicked to the right page before I pulled out my pen, ready to start my mission. Alright, question 1 begin!

__1\. Solve the simultaneous equation_ _

  _6x + 2y = -3_

_4x +3y = 11_

Okay…? This is okay right? I can totally do this without any help–

“Hey, can you put some music on?” A familiar voice cut through my thoughts and brought my attention back to reality. I suddenly realised that I was clutching my pen in a death grip so loosened my hold, before turning my head back to Karma who had an expectant look on his face.

“Huh?” I replied, not having paid attention to what he’d actually said. He clicked his tongue in response and I swear I saw him roll his eyes, but before I had time to retaliate he stood up and walked to my bedside table. I quirked an eyebrow as I had no idea what he was doing, but soon realised after he took his phone out his pocket and plugged it into my speaker system. A really chill song soon poured into the room, and seemed to lift the slightly awkward atmosphere that I hadn’t really noticed was there before. Karma wore a neutral expression as he sat back down and resumed his work, but I could tell that he was feeling much calmer after putting his music on.

We actually worked pretty well for about 20 minutes with the calm music playing in the background, and I’d realised that I hadn’t actually copied any of Karma’s work yet. I was about to move onto the final question that we had to do, when the song currently playing ended and a new one came on. I didn’t think much about it, but only a few seconds in I recognised what the song was and had to try hard to stifle my laughter. After glancing sideways at the boy next to me, I realised that he wasn’t quite aware of what was playing, and that caused a snort to escape my mouth. Karma was just turning around to see what was wrong with me when the lyrics to the song finally began.

_Oh... you touch my tra la la_

_Mmm… my ding ding dong_

His amber eyes widened comically almost immediately after the first line, and he hastily scrambled to the speakers. My amusement finally erupted in a fit of uncontrollable laughter, and it only got funnier as the redhead furiously ripped the speaker cord from his phone, his face completely crimson from embarrassment. He sat down heavily next to me, his expression totally empty as if he couldn’t believe what just happened. I tried really hard to compose myself but as soon as I began to gain any self-control, I was overtaken by another laughing fit.

Eventually I calmed down, and after wiping the tears from my eyes I turned back around to face a dejected-looking Karma. He returned my gaze, the humiliation still tinting his cheeks pink.

“Was… was that…?” I asked, obviously not having to elaborate on what I meant - I was certain that both of us knew exactly which song just came on, and I didn’t want to embarrass the redhead even more (even though it was just the two of us who’d witnesses what had just happened). He nodded his head solemnly in response, and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. I was still curious as to why he had the Ding Dong Song on his phone, but I didn’t want to make the situation any worse than it already was. Fortunately, my mum chose that exact moment to knock on my door and call us for dinner, to which Karma responded immediately and almost ran downstairs.

Dinner passed quickly enough and we eventually returned to my room, silently agreeing not to mention the song incident again. Karma seemed to have recovered well enough over the course of the meal, so at least things were more or less back to normal when we went back upstairs. Unsurprisingly, Karma didn’t put his music back on, but I didn’t mind too much as I finished up the homework I was working on prior to our little ‘distraction’.

We finished around the same time, and finally began to rehearse our lines for the first few scenes. It wasn’t too much effort as we’d already learnt most of that part anyway, but the main issue was recalling it without the script and remembering the stage directions. Karma seemed to have a much easier time than me, but I was really grateful that he was patient when I messed up certain parts (which happened more often than I cared to admit).

After about an hour and a half, the redhead decided that it was finally time for him to go home, so I helped him pack up and walked him to the door. Thankfully the evenings weren’t too dark yet, so at least he would be safe on his way home. After shutting the door behind him, I returned to my bedroom and simply lay on my bed, content with just daydreaming for a while.

-x-

And so the weeks went on. The leaves slowly changed colour and disappeared as the weather became colder and, before I knew it, autumn had morphed into winter. Nothing much happened during those weeks, but I guess you could say that Karma and I were finally on good terms. The word ‘friend’ still didn’t seem quite right, but there wasn’t really another word for our relationship. Don’t get me wrong, he was still a complete idiot - I just found that I didn’t really mind anymore. Something changed between us after that day at my house, but I would be lying if I said that it was a bad thing.

It feels weird to say it, but I can’t really imagine what my days would be like if I weren’t spending them with Karma. Yeah, we were kinda forced together by the school play and by Korosensei, but the friction between us eventually just faded away. I guess I even enjoy his company now. That probably had something to do with the fact that he somehow wiggled his way into our friendship group, and the fact that the rest of my friends welcomed him with open arms.

A yawning sound next to me brought me back to the present. It was before school on a Monday morning, and I was sitting in some english classroom with my friends all huddled around one desk. The conversation wasn’t particularly interesting, which was probably why I was a million miles away in a daydream. My eyes wandered to look at my friends, though I still wasn’t really paying attention to what they were saying.

There was Ritsu with her ever-sparkling eyes talking animatedly about something, her hands gesticulating excitedly. Kayano was politely nodding along, her hair looking slightly different today. Hm, maybe she was trying to impress someone? I smiled a little at that; I would have to ask her about it later. Sugino wasn’t even bothering to look interested in the conversation, with head rested in his palm and his eyes almost glazed over. Probably daydreaming about Kanzaki. Then there was Karma, who was sat just to the left of me. He looked pretty tired (so it was likely that he was the one who snapped me out of my daydream), but as soon as saw that I was looking at him, he met my gaze and gave me a cheeky wink and a lopsided grin. I rolled my eyes at that, but couldn’t help a small smile form on my lips.

I vaguely heard Ritsu exclaiming that this was going to be an amazing week. But I couldn’t ignore the nervous feeling in my stomach telling me otherwise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always thank you so much for reading! I'd love to hear what you think about my silly little story, so please drop a comment! Your messages are really what inspire me to write, so I just want to thank everyone who has commented already - you're the best. See you next week! x


	9. Under the Mistletoe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas everybody! And Happy Birthday Karma!! Hope you all have a wonderful day, whether you celebrate xmas or not!

The screech of the school bell finally rang, pulling me from yet another daydream. I quickly packed away all of my books and slipped out of the door to avoid getting stuck in the mass of people trying to get out. As I paced down the geography corridor, my mind was relatively blank; that was actually a rare occurrence lately. For some unknown reason, my thoughts had been almost overwhelming recently, to the point where I was getting so many headaches that I couldn’t even concentrate in class. I had no idea what was wrong with me, but even though I wasn’t too worried about it, my friends were all really concerned. Ah, I shouldn’t be thinking too deeply about this. It’ll just make my head hurt even more. I focused instead on the methodical thump of my feet as I made my way to meet my friends; at least I wouldn’t really have to think about anything with them. They would understand.

After a few minutes of walking, I turned the corner to enter our usual english classroom, but was met with an empty room. Huh, that’s weird. Where could they be…? I reluctantly made the decision to go to the canteen to see if my friends were there, but I was kinda dreading it. Not only was it usually packed full of people, but I knew that the sheer volume of their combined noise would make my headache even worse. Well, I’d just deal with that when it came to it.

I soon arrived at the canteen (though the noise wasn’t as bad as I’d expected), and I quickly identified my friends; but oddly enough, they were standing in quite a large group of people. Worriedly pacing towards them, my mind was whirring with thoughts as to what was going on - most of which involved why no one had bothered to tell me where they were. As I further approached the mass of people, Sugino caught my eye and waved me over. Before I could ask any questions or even raise a puzzled eyebrow, the boy in front of me began talking enthusiastically.

“Hey Nagisa, you’ll never guess what’s just happened!” I tilted my head in curiosity to prompt him to continue, as he was practically vibrating with excitement.

“We’ve been invited to a party! An actual party! Us! Oh my god I actually can’t believe–” I quickly cut off his ramblings before he could continue any further, otherwise I wouldn’t be surprised if he carried on all day.

“Hold on… What?” I enquired, my pounding headache not helping me process anything; and quite frankly, I didn’t have the patience to listen to Sugino’s mindless chattering today.

“A party!” he repeated, thankfully calming down a bit to try and explain things better.

“Rio’s hosting a Christmas house party and she’s basically invited the whole year. You’re gonna come right?” I had to try my best not to groan at that. A party? Since when did any of us go to parties? More importantly, since when any of us _want_ to go to parties? I mean, all they involved was loud dance music, drunk teenagers and gross couples making out in the middle of the room where everyone could see them. And then the few sober people (i.e. me) would be sitting miserably in the corner of a sofa wishing that they back at home. Yeah, in case you haven’t noticed already, I’m not a very extroverted person. And I particularly hate parties.

Sugino was still looking expectantly at me, and even though I desperately wanted to turn him down, I knew that I couldn’t just abandon my friends. Who knows, maybe it would actually be fun? Or maybe all of us would hate it, and then we could all go home together to make it look less weird? Well I guess that was it then. I plastered on my best smile and nodded confidently at Sugino, whose grin grew even wider.

“Yes! This is gonna be so much fun!” As he lead me through the mob of other people (who I assumed were also going to this party) back to our group, I wondered why on earth I had agreed. Eh, it’s too late to change my mind now.

-x-

Well damn. I was currently surrounded by a horde of dancing teens with my eardrums being assaulted by thundering dance music, the entire room completely packed full of overly-energetic people. Yep, the party was in full swing. When I had agreed to this on Monday, I hadn’t expected my Saturday night to be quite this awful.

I had lost my friends what felt like hours ago, and I had yet to find a quiet or even slightly-calmer corner of the house. After shoving through countless people, I eventually found my way to one of the sofas and ungracefully plonked down it, exhaling deeply from all the pushing and shoving - it wasn’t my fault people people were so goddamn enormous! I tried shutting my eyes to block out everything that was assaulting my senses, but it didn’t really do anything; the flashing strobe lights still penetrated through my eyelids and the dreadful music still pierced my eardrums. But that wasn’t even the worst of it: my headaches had only got worse throughout the week, and my head was practically pounding with pain right now.

After only a few minutes of relative ‘peace’ from the rest of the party, I felt the sofa suddenly jerk with movement and my eyes jumped open in shock. I whipped my head around to see what had happened, but I really wasn’t expecting the sight before me.

Isogai was sitting slightly sprawled on the other end of the sofa, clearly having been pushed by someone quite forcefully. As I looked a bit more, I could see that his face was quite flushed and his pupils were really dilated as he stared at one single point in front of him. Before I had time to turn and see what he was looking at, Maehara strode into my vision and stopped right in front of Isogai, clearly invading his personal space. I briefly registered that he too had a slightly pink face, before he boldly leaned in even closer and smashed his lips against Isogai’s, who seemed to respond eagerly. My face immediately went bright scarlet and I felt my cheeks burning as I twisted my head away from them. For the first time since I arrived at Rio’s house, my mind was completely blank. As if in a trance, I slowly lifted myself up from the sofa and ambled out of the room, surprisingly not being barricaded in by the many people dancing.

Friends. Right. Must find them… As I wandered into the kitchen, I spotted Sugino and Kayano casually chatting with Okuda. My body seemed to react by itself as I walked up to them, still in a weird dream-like state.

“Oh hey Nagisa,” Kayano greeted cheerfully, her usual friendly smile growing a little when she noticed me. I nodded absent-mindedly, not really registering what she had just said. Sugino exchanged a glance with her (obviously sensing that I wasn’t myself) before clearing his throat slightly awkwardly.“So, uh, have you seen Isogai anywhere? I kinda wanted to talk to him about–”

“No!” I cut off suddenly, startling everyone with the loud exclamation. “I mean… uh… I think he’s busy right now. Yeah, I saw him talking to… someone else…” I finished weakly, probably not convincing anyone with my feeble attempt at throwing them off-course. Honestly, I don’t know why I was acting so weird about the whole situation. Sure, I never saw _that_ coming, but it totally wasn’t a big deal… right? I have absolutely no problems with people being gay, but it was just a bit of a shock seeing those two doing… that. I had no idea that they were a thing...

Sugino nodded slowly before Kayano casually resumed her previous conversation with Okuda. Having mostly recovered from that string of awkward events, I decided that it was probably best to leave them be. As I strolled out of the kitchen, I wondered where Karma was. I’d only seen him briefly when we had all arrived here around an hour ago, so I decided to go see what he was up to. To be totally honest, I was a bit peeved that everyone around me seemed to be having the time of their lives. I couldn’t be the only one here who wasn’t enjoying themselves? Or maybe all the party-poopers stayed at home…? Probably a wise choice anyway.

As I rounded the hallway by the door, I was stopped dead in my tracks. Standing just in front of the entryway was Karma, and right beside him was Kanzaki. I know it’s bad to listen into other people's conversations, and I was just about to walk away, but a certain muttered sentence prevented my feet from moving.

“I’m sorry Kanzaki, but I refuse to back down.”

Karma’s voice had an oddly-dangerous undertone to it that I’d never heard before, and it caused a slight shiver to run down my spine. I really didn’t want to hear any more though, so I simply spun around and marched away to go and explore the house a bit more.

I didn’t feel too bad about snooping around Rio’s massive house - after all, if she really didn’t want people going into the rooms then there should be a sign or something. During my little exploration, I actually found an adorable ginger tabby sleeping on the floor of an empty spare room. After deciding to sit here for a while, I thought more about the incident downstairs. That deceitfully-calm tone… Just thinking about his uncharacteristic velvety voice seemed to make my heart pound just a bit louder in my ears. But that was ridiculous, so I must have been imagining it.

Well, this was boring. I slowly began stroking the cat next to me (whose purring quickly began to fill the whole room), before pulling out my phone and just playing some random games. I would have just gone home at this point, but I was getting a lift back to Sugino’s and I didn’t want to take him away from a party that he was genuinely enjoying. My mum was away for a couple of days in London, so I couldn’t really go back to my own house anyway. After glancing at the time, I realised that I would probably be here for a while. A rather weary sigh escaped my mouth. What should I think about?

A brief but crystal clear image of Karma and Kanzaki flashed through my mind and I reflexively jumped; why was I still thinking about them? Wait a second… Now that I thought about it, something about that scene was definitely wrong. I closed my eyes to try and picture what happened more clearly. Kanzaki was standing slightly to the left of Karma, who were both standing near the front door. The redhead’s face was kinda serious-looking or even desperate, but for some reason Kanzaki looked… unrelenting? Defiant? I’d never seen a negative expression on her face before, so maybe that’s what was wrong.

Wait. There was something else, I was sure of it. My eyes widened slightly as an almost-missable detail suddenly appeared in my mind’s eye. Mistletoe. They were standing under the mistletoe. My mind began whirring and jumping to so many conclusions that I almost had to hold my head with how much it was hurting. Was Karma rejected? Does he like her? How long has this gone on for? Why didn’t he tell me?

I squeezed my eyes shut tightly to try and muffle all the thoughts bouncing around in my brain. Calm down, stop making assumptions. Maybe it was just a coincidence? My heart clenched slightly at the thought, but I just discarded the feeling as me being ill. I must be, right? Maybe that’s why I was acting so hypersensitive to everything. My heart was still hammering inside my chest and nothing I was doing seemed to slow it down. I leant my head back against the wall with my eyes still closed, trying to focus on the sound of my heart beating instead of the pain inside my head.

A few minutes passed by like this; it could have been more, but I didn’t really care either way. When both my headache and heartbeat had finally calmed down, I opened my lids again and blinked blearily at the light inside the room. Hang on, I swore it was dark before…? I quickly swept my eyes over the room, and almost jumped out of my skin when they finally came to rest on a figure sitting right next to me - how had I noticed them before? More importantly, how did they get in without me hearing them?! A familiar mop of red hair barely hung out from under the figure’s hood, which I forcefully pulled away from his face.

“Oi, what was that for?” Karma grumbled, his expression slightly annoyed that he’d been disturbed. I simply returned a deadpan look, to which his irritated facade crumbled and a wonky smile spread across his lips.

“How did you get in?” I questioned, my previous anger having dissolved already - maybe it was a bit pathetic, but you couldn’t stay mad at Karma when he gave you that smile. Trust me, I’m sure it defeats everyone!

“Uh, through the door…?” he responded, feigning ignorance. We both knew that he’d sneaked in on purpose, so it didn’t take long for the two of us to break into a fit of laughter; it was made even funnier by the fact that when Karma tries to hide his laughter, it gets even worse. Like really worse. He always said that he hated his laugh, but every time I heard those uncontrollable giggles and snorts, it only made me laugh even harder until tears streamed down my face and my ribs ached.

At long last we finally calmed down into a comfortable silence, just leaning against the wall of the empty room, the only sound being faint dance music that had leaked in from downstairs. I really didn’t want to ruin the atmosphere, but there was one burning subject at the front of my mind that I had to ask Karma about.

“So… I saw you talking to Kanzaki earlier. Everything good?” I asked carefully, my voice calm and quiet as if I were scared to shatter the delicate mood.

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” he said, and I swore I heard his voice slightly strain with the words. I wasn’t really worried about him per say, I just didn’t want him to feel like he had to hide things from me. I felt like we’d come too far for that.

“If it isn’t, you can tell me. You can tell me anything,” I barely whispered, fearful that he would snap if I pushed him too far. Karma was silent for a moment, as if he were thinking about saying something. I held my breath in anticipation, letting him speak at his own pace. It took a while, but eventually he spoke again.

“I… I was just talking to her about something. It’s not important.” My heart sank slightly at those words as he was clearly carrying some sort of burden, but at the same time I didn’t want to pressure him to talk if he didn’t want to. Which was obvious. A weird feeling was tugging at my insides - Karma must be hiding something serious if he would hide it from me so obviously. I tried to catch his eye but he refused to meet my gaze, worry and maybe even pain written across his whole face. In an attempt to comfort him slightly, I began to reach my hand out to him; but before I could do anything, Karma suddenly stood up and mumbled some kind of excuse, before pacing out the door.

My hand was still frozen in mid-air by the time he left, but it quickly clenched into a fist as anger started to bubble up inside me. What was his problem? If he didn’t want to talk to me about it, then fine. Just don’t make a massive scene and make me feel like the guilty one here! With resentment still flowing through my veins, I sent a quick text to Sugino telling him that I was going back to my own house and not to wait up for me. I was supposed to be staying with him whilst my mum was away on business, but thankfully she was only going to be gone until Christmas eve. That gave me about a week by myself - and in all honesty, I would rather be home alone than stay here any longer. Having made up my mind, I jogged downstairs and grabbed my jacket before slipping out the front door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! Many things that haven’t really made sense so far will start linking together soon enough, so I’d love to know what you think is going on! Anyways, I'll see you guys next week! x


	10. Black and Blue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Slight trigger warning: if you don't want to read scenes of violence, just skip to the break in the chapter. Hope you enjoy!

As soon as I left the front door, I was quickly hit with a blast of icy winter wind, almost immediately causing me to shiver. I tightly wrapped my jacket around me as I began to walk down the road and back to my own house - it was about a 20 minute walk away, so I gradually picked up my pace to get out of the cold as quickly as possible.

During my walk, I noticed that the streets were relatively deserted with few cars on the road, so I allowed myself to daydream slightly just to pass the time quicker. I wasn’t too worried; even though I’d never been to Rio’s house before, I knew where it was and could easily find my way back home.

As I slowly slipped into a world of my own, I began to think about Karma’s strange actions earlier. He hadn’t been in one of his weird moods for weeks, and I wondered what had triggered it. Was it me…? I shook my head quickly to rid my head of that thought, otherwise I knew I’d end up blaming myself for everything. What was it then? Maybe he just didn’t want to talk to me about that thing with Kanzaki? I knew that if it were me then I wouldn’t really want to talk about it, but I wouldn’t just stomp off with no explanation. That’s just mean.

Whatever, I was probably just being immature. Who cares if Karma doesn’t come to me when he has a problem? Not me. Nope. It wasn’t even my business in the first place, so I shouldn’t have brought it up.

Whilst I was in a world of my own, I had actually failed to realise that the streets were not as deserted as I’d first thought. In fact, I shouldn’t have zoned out in the first place. Because before I knew what was going on, a hand clamped over my mouth.

I was too shocked to even utter a sound as the unknown figure yanked me harshly into some dark side-alley. Completely disorientated from the speed of everything happening, I couldn’t even struggle against the iron grip that I was in, let alone try to escape. After being thrown down on the ground like a limp rag-doll with my head still spinning, I vaguely felt myself start to dissociate from the situation. The burning pain in my skull from both my headache and the impact with the ground began to fade into the distance. I guess that was my way of dealing with what was going on.

The bulky figure from before quickly came into my peripheral view, before he firmly pushed my shoulder down to the ground with the toe of his boot, causing me to lie flat on my back. I didn’t even register my vision taking on a water-like quality as at least two more dark figures leant over me, snickering slightly at their little ‘catch’. Before I could try and make out their faces, an agonising bolt of pain shot through my stomach as a heavy boot smashed into my body. A strangled scream escaped through my lips, immediately snapping me out my own dream-like trance. A rough palm slapped against my mouth, clearly trying to silence my cries. Hot streams of tears began to run down my face as I finally realised what was going on.

“Don’t worry little girl, we won’t do anything bad… I promise,” a rough voice whispered in my ear, causing shivers to run through my body. Little girl…? Ah. They thought I was a girl. Wouldn’t be the first time.

Another swift kick to my gut pulled me out of my thoughts, but the hand clamped over my face muffled the sharp cry that left my stinging throat. All at once, I felt several pairs of hands digging into all my pockets, resolutely searching for something valuable. I desperately wanted to say that there wasn’t anything there, I only had my phone, please don’t hurt me, let me go! But my throat was already raw from the few cries and muffled screams that I let out, so my pleas were never heard.

“Don’t you have anything on you, little girl? I hope for your sake that you do,” a familiar brittle voice hummed into my ear, compelling me to shut my eyes in an attempt to drown everything out.

_It’s okay, this is just a dream. This isn’t actually happening. You’re fine._

A crushing pain suddenly erupted over my right eye, emitting yet another piercing wail of pain; but that wasn’t all. The hands searching my torso abruptly stopped, and I breathed a shallow sigh of relief. But those hands quickly turned into fists and before I knew it, I was getting pommeled everywhere the dark figures seemed to reach. My head was slowly getting fuzzier the more I tried to pry my eyes open. The overwhelming pain in my entire body didn’t allow me to even move an inch, so when the fists eventually stopped pounding me, I couldn’t even react.

“It seems you were hiding something from us after all, little girl,” the husky voice whispered again. “Well, I think I can forgive you this time. See you around cupcake.”

My eyes immediately began watering as I watched the shadowy figures casually stroll away. The stranger's words had triggered something inside me. A memory that I’d almost forgotten.

_Karma…_

That stupid nickname. Of all the things he could have called me, it had to be that. And what had he taken? I didn’t even have anything on me! I could still feel my phone securely in my back pocket, so it wasn’t that. My head was throbbing even worse now, and I didn’t know what to do with myself. I couldn’t walk. I couldn’t even fucking move. I was useless. Despite the angry tears still rolling down my face, I felt myself gradually slipping into oblivion. Probably a better thing to be unconscious than in pain anyway…

Just before my eyes closed completely, my vision still hazy, I swore I saw a flash of scarlet bolting towards me. The idea was almost laughable though. Most likely something my brain had conjured up to calm me down. And with that, I gave into the clutches of darkness.

-x-

The first thing I felt when I woke up was an aching pain all throughout my body, my head throbbing slightly. The bed beneath me tried to tempt me back to sleep, but some unnerving feeling urged me to get up. I slowly tried to pry my eyes open, and to my relief the room was quite dark. My vision swam slightly as I glanced around, but I instantly forgot about that as I was met with an unfamiliar sight. Where the hell was I? I started to panic, desperately trying to sit up and get away from wherever this place was. All the memories of that dark alley suddenly came rushing back to me, causing my mind jump to all sorts of conclusions. Had they kidnapped me? How long had I been asleep? Had they… had they done anything to me…?

Just before I started hyperventilating, a warm hand gently rested on my shoulder. I whipped my head around as fast as I could to see who had touched me, immediately recoiling from the oddly comforting touch.

I felt my breath hitch slightly when my eyes rested on the figure in front of me. My mind went completely blank as I stared like a lost child into those strangely bewitching amber orbs. For a moment, there was absolute silence. The only sound I heard was the thudding of my own heart pounding inside my chest.

A quiet sob suddenly escaped my lips, and before I had registered what was happening, I practically threw myself at the boy in front of me, desperately clutching onto the front of his shirt. After a brief moment of surprise, Karma slowly encased me in his comforting arms, silently holding me in place. The tears quickly arrived and I tried to lift my head up to avoid getting his shirt wet; when I tried to do so however, a firm hand pushed me back against his shoulder.

After that I just gave in. I wept in Karma’s arms for what felt like hours, countless emotions bubbling up and causing me to cry even harder. I didn’t care anymore that I was completely soaking his shirt; I only wanted– no, _needed_ to just have him with me. Nothing more. In fact, I don’t think there was anyone else in the world I would rather have embracing me. I guess it just felt right. Natural…

I don’t really remember what happened after that - maybe I tired myself out from so much crying that I just fell asleep in that warm hold. All that I knew was that when I finally awoke again, Karma had obviously tucked me back into bed, with no sign of the redhead himself. That was okay though: I didn’t expect him to stay with me. A strange feeling twisted in my gut at the thought, but it was probably just my stomach hurting from the bruises that surely would have blossomed there overnight.

My heart leapt at the sound of the door opening, as I hastily sat up to see who it was. After all, this clearly wasn’t my house.

“Tch, you should be resting,” the silky tone reprimanded. The corner of my mouth twitched upwards as I lay back down, relieved that the owner of the voice had returned. But I would never have admitted that.

As the redhead resumed his position on a chair next to my bed, I noticed that he was holding a bundle of supplies: antiseptic, bandages, plasters, the whole package. My eyes drifted towards the ceiling as Karma prepared to do whatever it was that he was going to do, and I let a small smile tug at my lips.

Everything was going to okay. Karma was taking care of me.

I ended up spending the next few days in the Akabane household, the same routine playing over every day: wake up on Karma’s floor (on a mattress though, don’t worry), get dressed, hang around, etcetera. Luckily we had a week off school, so at least I didn’t have to face anyone else in my current state. It wasn’t much different from being at home, except I was in a different house and I was constantly in close quarters with Karma; I thought I wouldn’t be able to handle it after the first day, but I eventually realised that I actually enjoyed spending more time with him. It sounds super lame but there was something kinda… captivating about seeing that dopey half-asleep grin first thing in the morning, something confounding about the way a permanent smile seemed to be fixed to my face during those few days we spent together…

I felt my face start to flush at how goddamn stupid I was being, so I decided to zone back into what was happening around me. Flurries of sounds began to flow back into my ears, the carefree jeers of teenagers once again surrounding me as I continued to walk through the school. My mum had returned from her trip to London a couple of days ago, so I no longer had to stay at Karma’s house; and oddly enough, I had to convince myself that it was the right thing. Tch, I was so clingy. Just because we spent a few days together didn’t change anything.

I hadn’t told my mum about what happened to me, and fortunately I was able to cover up any visible bruises. Although to be honest, I’d hidden myself away from her most of the time, as I was so paranoid that she would catch a glimpse of the sickening welts scattered across my body. In fact, I’d made a point of leaving much earlier this morning to avoid seeing her.

The further I kept walking, the more I noticed the dull ache throughout my body slowly getting worse. Thankfully a lot of the swelling had gone down after a few days, but the bruises still cast gruesome patterns all across my skin, the nauseating purple mess acting as a constant reminder of what happened in that dim alleyway. I swallowed thickly as I quickly cast away the memories from that night, focusing instead on pulling my hood further over my face to draw attention away from myself. It was the first day back at school again, and I was grateful that our school didn’t have a strict dress code - at least I could get away with wearing a hoodie to try and hide my body.

It sounds kinda stupid, but I felt like people knew what had happened. I was so scared that if they did, they would treat me like some sort of victim; all I wanted to do was forget about the whole thing. Of course I hadn’t told my friends either. At first I’d wanted to, but after seeing the way Karma had fussed over me for the past few days I knew that the others just wouldn’t leave me alone. Yeah, I knew I was weak. I knew it wasn’t my fault that I just happened to be a target. And yet I couldn’t help but blame myself for what happened.

As I rounded the corner of some random corridor, I almost walked straight into a tall figure. I would have done too, if they didn’t have such quick reflexes and step away just in time. Before I had time to mumble some kind of apology, my hood was abruptly pulled down and I met the intense and rather disconcerting gaze of Karma. My brow furrowed as I saw his expression turn even darker, but couldn’t open my mouth to say anything as I felt a strong hand wrap around my wrist and yank my arm determinedly. I decided not to try and question what he was doing for now, thankful at least that he wasn’t gripping my arm too tightly - after all, I still bore the hideous bracelets of bruises where I’d been… held down.

We soon marched into the boy's bathroom and I was suddenly released, only for Karma to turn around and lock the main door behind us (don’t even ask why there’s a lock there, it’s a long story). No one else was in there with us, so I assumed Karma wanted to talk to me about something private. Still too afraid to say anything, I simply waited for Karma to start talking.

He wordlessly turned back around, his expression noticeably less angry than before. I couldn’t quite tell what he was thinking right then, the emotions written across his face were all blurring together into something indistinguishable. Those amber eyes suddenly locked with my own blue ones, forcefully conveying a million thoughts and feelings that words someone wouldn’t be able to say - and I hated it. Anxiety, sadness, anger; but most of all: guilt.

“I… I’m so sorry,” he whispered, his voice almost inaudible. Huh...? What did he mean? I slowly crept closer to Karma as I tilted my head in confusion, an increasingly worried look working its way onto my face. His gaze never left mine, as if some kind of temporary paralysis prevented us from looking away. I began to zone out of what was happening, completely transfixed by those glowing amber orbs. I’d never noticed it before, but there were little flecks of gold speckled across his iris, almost flickering like sparks from a flame. I briefly wondered why I’d never noticed it before.

“Nagisa…?” That soft voice was enough to pull me out of my daydream, and I once again focused on the boy in front of me. Instead of continuing however, Karma finally broke our gaze and rifled through his bag, clearly searching for something. A few seconds later he gingerly pulled out some kind of small container, before unscrewing the lid and dabbing his finger into its contents. Only then did I register that he was holding a pot of… concealer. Upon seeing my puzzled expression, the redhead stopped what he was looking and looked blankly back at me.

“... Have you not looked in the mirror this morning?” he asked softly, clearly not wanting to alarm me. Despite that though, I felt my heartbeat instantly start to accelerate as I rushed to the nearest mirror in the bathroom. My breath hitched in my throat as stared at my reflection. Garish splotches of colour encompassed my right eye in a vortex of mottled blues and greens, the deep colours made even worse by the contrast of my ghostly skin. It must have appeared sometime yesterday, otherwise I’m sure my mum would have seen it. Not wanting to look at the mess on my face any longer, I turned back around to look at Karma, my mind oddly vacant.

He wordlessly stepped closer and began dabbing the pale concealer around my eye, his feather-like touch gently caressing my face to avoid hurting me too much. A tiny smile tugged at my lips. I was so lucky to have found Karma.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been a while since I last updated. A-levels are fricking hard, and with exams coming up I'll probably only be able to post every other week. I try really hard to write when I can, but I'd rather take my time and write something I'm proud of rather than rushing just for the sake of updating more frequently. Thanks to everyone for understanding, and for all your kudos and comments - they always brighten my day and I'm so blessed to have such supportive readers. Anyways, thanks for reading and I hope to see you for the next chapter!


	11. Cabin in the Woods

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, I'm back with another chapter! Since my update schedule has completely fallen apart, I figured I might as well just update whenever a new chapter is ready, and that happens to be today so here ya go! I really hope you enjoy this one! x

After the incident in the bathroom, Karma and I both went our separate ways to our different classes. Unsurprisingly, nothing exciting really happened. Professor Bitch droned on for what seemed like hours about poor grammar, but I quickly zoned out of her rant and let my eyes drift to gaze through the glass beside me; not for the first time, I was thankful that my desk was right next the window. My eyes swept lazily over the landscape, glancing over the school field and the dense woods that lay just beyond that.

As I focused on the spindly bare branches of the trees in the distance, I noticed what looked like a roof hidden amongst a cluster of trees. I blinked slowly, trying to figure out what was hidden there, but the moment was cut short by a loud voice pulling me out of my trance-like state.

“Mr Shiota! You’d better not be daydreaming in my class!” I jumped slightly at the sharp voice, quickly snapping my gaze to the front of the classroom where a certain irritated professor was impatiently tapping her foot against the hard wooden floor.

“S-Sorry,” I mumbled sheepishly, inwardly berating myself at getting so distracted, especially with such a strict teacher just a few metres away. Luckily enough, Professor Bitch just clicked her tongue and continued her teaching, not being one to waste a second during her precious English lessons. Still feeling slightly flustered at being caught, I put my head down and began scribbling some notes.

I somehow made it all the way to lunchtime without getting too distracted again, and soon enough the sharp ringing of the bell sliced through the air, quickly followed by the clamouring of students desperate to leave the classroom. As my feet paced through the halls, my mind was dragged back to the image of that strange building hidden in the woods - at least, that’s what I assumed it was. Anyway, since those woods were technically still on school grounds, that meant that the building must be part of the school too, right? So why had I never seen or even heard of it before? Hmm, maybe it was just an abandoned building or something…

Being too preoccupied by my inner monologue, I hadn’t noticed that I’d made it to our usual classroom, and I was quickly greeted by the familiar smiles of my friends.

“Heya,” I greeted casually, allowing a smile to tug at my lips as I took a seat next to Karma.

“Hey Nagisa!” Kayano replied chirpily, flashing me her usual bright grin. I still couldn’t get that stupid building out my head, so I decided to ask my friends about it.

“So,” I began, “do you guys happen to know about the building in the woods just beyond the field?” Karma simply raised an eyebrow at this, and both girls seemed to look just as confused as I felt. When I turned to face Sugino however, his face had taken on a slightly pale hue and his pupils were strangely-dilated; upon seeing his face, a deep sense of dread settled itself in my stomach. Before I could ask what was wrong, he began speaking in a low, slightly hushed tone.

“T-That building,” he stammered. “Don’t tell me you went in it.” I had no idea why he was acting like this, and I was absolutely desperate to know why he was so scared of that place.

“Huh? No, I just saw it from a classroom window earlier; I had no idea that it was even there before. Sugino… what are you so afraid of?” At this, the boy in question took a deep breath and slightly relaxed. He shot a brief but odd glance at Kayano and Ritsu, but I didn’t have time to wonder what it meant before Sugino began talking again.

“It’s an abandoned building, no-one knows how long it’s been there. Only a few remaining students have heard about the history of the place, as the teachers refuse to tell anyone about it. I overheard some older students talking about it a couple of weeks ago, and ever since then  I’ve refused to go and investigate it myself.” A visible shiver ran through his body at that, causing Kayano to gulp anxiously. I shot a brief glimpse at Karma, but his face was unreadable.

“Apparently it’s an old cram-school building that the headmaster used to own, but it hasn’t been used for teaching in years. Not many people know of its existence as we never really go into the woods, but some find out about it and decide to investigate for themselves. I don’t think anyone has ever gone in and come out the same person…”

Now I’m not a very superstitious person, but I couldn’t help but feel uneasy at what Sugino was saying - he looked way too serious to be joking about any of this, and that fact alone was enough to set me on edge. As his gaze locked onto mine, I gave a stiff nod for him to continue.

“I have no idea what’s in there. I’ve always been too afraid to go in, as the only real time that you can do so is in the evening when all of the staff have gone home. There’s no explicit rule that students can’t go in there, but I don’t even want to think about the consequences if someone got caught.”

There was an air of finality about that last sentence, and I knew that the others sensed it too as we all exhaled in unison. The room was completely silent for a minute as we all digested this new information, and surprisingly enough it was Ritsu who broke the silence.

“I think we should go in.”

Her bold tone completely caught me off guard, and it was all I could do to stop my jaw from dropping open completely.

“A-Are you crazy?!” I spluttered, shooting her an incredulous look.

“How scary can it be?” she began, a confident grin having settled itself on her face. “If we don’t go and see for ourselves, we’ll never know what’s in there. You’re not frightened, right?” she asked innocently, though I couldn’t help but feel as if she was taunting me.

I simply clicked my tongue at this and tried not to look as flustered as I felt. Still not completely sure about this plan, I glanced at the others to gauge their thoughts about this. Kayano was sharing a glance with Sugino, and I was almost certain that they were having some kind of telepathic conversation. Instead of asking what they were doing however, I just tilted my head to look at Karma, who looked strangely lost in thought. His eyes immediately snapped to lock with mine, and I simply raised an eyebrow in question. A mischievous smirk slowly stretched across his lips before his familiar silky tone filled the silence around us.

“Sure, why not. Although I do think we should go at the weekend just to be safe - after all, if something bad happens we don’t want to be stuck in there overnight.” I almost let out a little whine at that, but I stopped myself just in time to avoid the embarrassment. As I looked around at the others, they all seemed way too keen to follow through with this plan. I sighed deeply in defeat. Oh well. I guess it can’t be so bad.

-x-

I rubbed my eyes sleepily as my feet trod through the smooth earth of the woods, following the footsteps of the excited girls and the slightly-less excited Sugino in front of me. It was a bright Saturday morning and the air around was completely silent, save for the sounds of our footsteps and the occasional passing comment about a woodland creature (always provided by an overly-enthusiastic Ritsu). I heard Karma behind me huff slightly in exasperation, and I turned around to flash him a toothy grin; we’d only been walking for a couple of minutes, and he was bored already! Heh, serves him right for suggesting that we come here in the first place.

The smirk was quickly wiped off my face however, as I felt my foot catch on something in the underbrush. The last thing I saw were a pair of wide owlish eyes before the Earth tilted beneath me and I squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for the imminent pain to envelop my body. The impact never came though, and my eyes sprang open to see what had stopped my fall.

I immediately felt my face start to flush as I was met with similarly shocked-looking expression, amber eyes boring into my own blue ones with an indistinguishable gaze. After realising that I’d been staring, I quickly snapped back to reality and barely even registered the arms wrapped around me before I scrambled to stand up.

“You okay?” The concerned tone only served to make me even more self-conscious, and I tried my best to hide my face as I turned around and began hastily brushing myself off.

“Me? Y-Yeah, of course! Why wouldn’t I be fine! Aha, silly old me! Let’s keep going!” I inwardly cringed at my strained tone, but decided to ignore it as I picked up my pace and tried to catch up with the others, who clearly had no idea what just happened.

It only took a few more minutes to reach the clearing, where I stopped abruptly upon facing the old, decrepit building that stood before us. I gulped slightly as I gazed up at the ominous sight in front of me, thankful that we’d come when there was plenty of daylight. As I crept closer to the entrance, I couldn’t help but notice the crooked panels covering the walls and most of the roof; obviously someone had tried to fix it in the past, but must have quickly given up if the gaping holes all over the property were anything to go by.

By the time I’d finished inspecting the entire perimeter, my friends were waiting for me by the door. Ritsu had her hand on the sliding door and looked to me as if asking for the go-ahead, and the others were all glancing at me with anticipated expressions. I took a shallow breath, mentally preparing myself for whatever was inside as I gave a sharp nod before I had the chance to change my mind.

After a sharp tug, the door clunked open and we were faced with a dusty old corridor, the wooden tiles on the floor slightly dull from the lack of maintenance. The others began to wander through the doors and soon disappeared from sight, whispering about something amongst themselves. I wanted to follow them, but my legs were frozen in place. I started to panic, but then a large warm hand settled itself gently on my lower back, instantly dissolving the anxiety that had started to bubble up inside me.

A familiar mop of red hair came into my peripheral vision as Karma came to stand beside me, but he didn’t say anything as he gently guided me inside. My heart was hammering inside my chest and I didn’t trust my voice to work, so I decided to just let it happen - after all, he wasn’t doing anything wrong. It wasn’t his fault I became a nervous wreck when it came to things like this. Ahh, why was I still thinking about it?! God, get a grip of yourself Nagisa! He’s just touching your back to reassure you, to take your mind off what’s around you–

I was suddenly hyper-aware of my surroundings, my eyes darting wildly around the corridor to try and assess the situation as quickly as possible, not trusting anything. Karma must have felt my body tense up, as I swear I felt him pull me slightly closer - it could have just been my imagination, but either way I wasn’t really complaining. Wait, what? I did _not_ just think that. Nope. It wasn’t like I was feeling safer being close to him or anything. And no, I couldn’t feel the warmth of his palm radiating through the back of my shirt and sending shivers down my spine–

Whoa, let’s stop that train of thought right there. Gah, what the hell was wrong with me?

A strange clicking sound cut through my thoughts, making me whip my head around to locate the source of the noise. My eyes narrowed as they rested on Kayano, who was standing at the opposite end of the classroom we’d just walked into; I wasn’t fooled for a second by her innocent smile, and my gaze hardened as I spotted her phone being shoved into her jacket pocket.

“Kayano…?” I asked, my voice oddly calm as I met her slightly-nervous gaze. “What did you just do?” Her face paled a little before she let out an abrupt laugh and flashed me a not-so-subtle wink, her usual smile twisted into a mischievous smirk.

“Haha, why would little old me be up to something?” she chortled before turning her head to look at something behind us. “Ah, there you are Ritsu~ Let’s leave the boys alone to explore a little, hm?” And with that, she practically skipped out of the room, before linking her arm with Ritsu’s and guiding them back down the hallway. I didn’t get a good look at the lavender-haired girl’s face before she turned away, but I swore I saw the same impish grin plastered on her mouth. What the hell were those two up to? I decided not to think too deeply about it; if I did, I’d probably just end up worrying about too many possibilities, and that was always dangerous territory.

It was just then that I remembered Karma’s hand still placed firmly on my back, and I jumped back slightly, suddenly feeling really self-conscious. His hand wavered slightly, before dropping off my waist entirely and returning to his side. I tried desperately to ignore the strange aching sensation in my chest (and no I was _not_ feeling disappointed), before I turned around and walked back out of the room, not even noticing that Karma wasn’t following me.

I walked all the way to what I assumed was the faculty lounge before I noticed that I was alone. The previous anxiety that I was feeling had worked its way back again, and I was starting to feel way more nervous than I should have been - after all, this was just some old building. Not like I was in any real danger or anything… right? Ah, I wish I was better at deluding myself. Despite knowing that I was being completely irrational, I couldn’t stop my heart from hammering inside my chest as I peered back around the hallway, searching for any sign of my friends. Come to think of it, I hadn’t really heard any of them talking since we got here, with the obvious exception of Kayano earlier.

“H-Hey guys, where’d you go?” I called into the distance, cursing at myself for stammering. No reply. “This isn’t funny, you know…” I muttered weakly, my voice trailing off as I realised that I was alone here. Oh my god, what do I do? My mind was whirring as I thought about the possibilities of what had happened to my friends.

It couldn’t be prank. Even if the rest of them wanted to freak me out, I know that Karma wouldn’t leave me alone; he knew that I was scared of this place! R-Right? I felt my face completely drain of all colour as I thought about it. What was stopping him from leaving?

Out of nowhere, a hand grasped my shoulder and I immediately jumped away, barely suppressing a shriek of surprise.

“Whoa, it’s only me, calm down!” As I snapped my head around, I was met with a familiar wide-eyed gaze.

“Jesus fucking _Christ_ , Karma! Don’t _ever_ scare me like that again! Where the hell were you?!” I demanded, quickly trying to diffuse my anger before I said something I would regret. Karma huffed in response, closing his eyes briefly before replying.

“Tch, it’s all Sugino’s fault. Turns out he completely made up the whole story about this place, he wanted to freak us out by taking us here. Obviously Kayano and Ritsu were in on it too; they tried to put a bag over my head whilst I was outside looking for you. Damn meddling girls, I almost took Kayano’s eye out when she jumped me.”

...Huh? It took a second for me to process the information, and before I could control myself I snorted and gave in to a fit of giggles, laughing even harder at the thought of Karma’s overly-defensive reflexes. Just as I started to get a grip and calm down, the redhead began chuckling too, and that set me off again.

Eventually, we both gathered our composure and headed back out of the building to find those sneaky bastards. After throwing some affectionate and not-so-affectionate insults, we decided to head back home - and by that, I meant going to Sugino’s house to eat trash and watch Netflix for countless hours.

Man, what a day. Despite feeling angry at my friends for being so mean earlier, I couldn’t help but feel a certain level of endearment towards them too. As I pulled my gaze away from the TV, I felt my lips quirk up slightly as I saw the whole group squished together on one sofa, munching away on the several bowls of popcorn we had. Even though we all had our flaws, I was so lucky that I’d found these guys.   
No matter what happened, these people were my family. And I loved them all to pieces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I can't even go one chapter without describing Karma's eyes... Oh well :D 
> 
> Anyways, I changed the located of the 3-E building a bit to fit the story, so I hope you guys don't mind. Also, I've been feeling kinda rubbish about this story lately; I've got the ending completely sorted, but I feel like the chapters are getting kinda boring. I usually have no plans with what to do for each chapter, I tend to have a basic idea of what to do and just start writing. Recently though, I feel like it's just not enough, and the last thing I want is for my story to end up as a jumble of events all squished together. I love getting your feedback on this, and I am SO grateful for every single comment that I get. 
> 
> Sorry if I come across as being passive aggressive in these notes sometimes, I honestly don't mean to be! Idk, I'm kinda rambling so I'll just go now! See you guys on the next one! =^_^= x


	12. A/N - I'm so sorry...

Hey guys, so you've probably noticed that I've been super inactive lately. I know that I'm always apologising for updating so infrequently, but I can't express how sorry I am for leaving such big gaps in between chapters.

I'm not planning on leaving this forever - in fact, I'll never abandon this fic. However, I really need a break for a while. I don't know how long it will last, but probably at least until May and my exams are over. As I've already said, I'm honestly so sorry about this, but I feel like I just need one less thing to worry about for now.

Anyways, thanks so much for the continued support on my story. You guys really inspire me to keep going with this. Well, I guess I'll see you on the next chapter! Bye bye! 

⁽˙ˆ˙̫ˆ˙⁾ *~ x


	13. Blast from the Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! :D  
> So this chapter is quite a bit longer than usual (to make up for my massive hiatus) and it's a bit of a roller coaster, so I really hope you enjoy! x

The next few weeks flew by. After our little adventure to the old building in the woods, it actually became a regular hang-out spot for us to come to; as practically no-one knew about it, we could finally find some true peace and solitude when the actual school building got too much. In fact, Karma and I often went there to rehearse our lines for the play - the quiet atmosphere was perfect for setting the mood and getting into character.

One day after school, I found myself chasing a certain redhead through the trees, expertly weaving my way through the now-familiar territory of the dense woods. A stupid grin was plastered across my face as I felt the rush of wind coursing through my hair, pumping my legs even harder to try and beat the redhead to the entryway of our newly-found headquarters. Just as I rounded a corner and sped into the clearing, I noticed with glee that Karma was nowhere to be seen, meaning that I had finally beaten him there. I slowed down into a slow walk as I strutted towards the building, a smug grin shamelessly tugging at my lips as I slid open the door with a theatrical flourish.

Before I had time to process anything, a flash of red zoomed towards me and let out a horrible cry. I felt my whole body jump as I practically fell over, an embarrassing shriek filling the air and causing the back of my neck to heat up as I blushed deeply. Quickly gathering my composure, I whipped my head upwards to try and determine what the hell had just happened, only to see the red headed devil himself doubled-over and snorting with laughter. My eyes narrowed as I stood up and took a step towards Karma, before I shoved his shoulder in annoyance.

“You ass!” I snapped, getting even more frustrated that my forceful push had done nothing to move the boy in front of me - not for the first time, I cursed my stupid height and weak stature.

“S-Sorry,” Karma snickered, not sounding the least bit apologetic. I simply narrowed my eyes in response, deciding that the silent treatment was a suitable punishment for him quite literally getting the jump on me. After a minute of our mini staring contest, I finally cracked and felt a little smile twitching at the corner of my lips. An obnoxious smirk spread across Karma’s face at that, before he lightly punched my shoulder and spun away with a dramatic flair that I couldn’t help but snort at.

I followed the taller boy through the old corridors to the main classroom, tugging at my bag strap in a futile attempt to ease the weight from my shoulder. Damn teachers and their never-ending piles of textbooks. When I entered the large room, I was slightly taken aback by what was in front of me. All of the desks and chairs that were usually scattered across the room were neatly tucked away against the walls, leaving a wide space in the middle of the room that seemed to be covered in piles of… pillows? Striding through the doorway and letting my bag gracelessly drop the floor, I scanned the room for any sign of the other boy, but couldn’t see him anywhere.

Before I could call out, Karma stepped out what I recognised as the storage room with his arms overflowing with bundles of blankets and other pillows. He quickly caught my eye and winked, not bothering with an explanation for what on earth he was doing.

“Building a nest?” I offered, still really confused at to what was going on. In response, Karma dumped the pile in his arms onto the ever-growing mountain that was already on the floor, before spreading his arms and raising an expectant eyebrow in my direction. My incredulous grin never faltered as I sauntered up to the redhead, watching him flop onto the pile with an amusing lack of elegance.

“I don’t know how we never found these before - the supply room was full of them and _they’re so soft and comfy and you need to get your ass over here like right now,”_ Karma drawled, his voice laced with pure tranquility. I was too distracted by his silken voice to actually pay attention to what he was saying, so I almost froze as I felt surprisingly strong fingers tugging my wrist until I sprawled onto the well-padded floor, my shoulder digging sharply into the other boys thigh.

While I was trying to compose myself from my less than graceful descent, Karma made no indication that he was going to move from his surely painful position; after all, how comfortable must it be to have some bony joint lodged against your leg? And no, I totally did _not_ notice how muscular his leg was as I braced myself against it in order to prop myself back up again. Okay maybe I noticed, but it was just a simple matter of appreciation… right? Who knew that Karma had a pair of such lean yet athletic legs hidden under those baggy school trousers that left so much to the imagination - which I totally wasn’t thinking about. No legs in my brain. Nope.

I tried to look like I wasn’t almost groping Karma as I braced myself to sit upright, quickly retracting my hands as soon as I was stable again. Thankfully the boy sitting next to me said nothing, although I swore his fiery eyes regarded me with an almost curious look, before his face smoothed back into its usual lax expression.

“I told you it was comfortable, right?” Karma teased, offering me a obnoxious grin, before giving a large and very melodramatic sigh. “Ahh~ it’s like laying in a nest of exquisitely soft clouds, or pressed against a duvet stuffed full of feathers, fit for Artemis herself!” I rolled my eyes at his extravagant description, but allowed the redhead to enjoy his moment of contentment as I stood up once again and placed my hands on my hips - one of us had to be the responsible one, and we didn’t come here to mess around. We actually had lines to practice, and I’d been struggling for ages to get through this particular scene without breaking my serious facade.

Karma begrudgingly left the comfort of his little (and by little I mean massive) pile of comfort of that I still can’t believe we hadn’t found earlier. It took a few minutes for me to convince the other boy to take apart his makeshift bed, and the only way that I could convince Karma to do so was to _pinky promise_ that we could reassemble it later. After kicking away the various blankets and pillows to clear the centre of the room, we retrieved the scripts from our bags and flipped to the scene that we were supposed to be practising today. I took a quick glance at my phone to check that we hadn’t wasted too much time, and thankfully we still had a while before it got too late.

“Alright,” I began, “let’s go from the very beginning of this scene. Please don’t try to distract me this time, I really need to get this scene sorted out,” I said, shooting Karma a pointed look. He cocked his head in faux confusion and opened his mouth in protest, but I cut him off before he could say anything. “Don’t try to deny it! You know exactly how to throw me off course without making it look like your fault, but I _know_ you do it on purpose.”

I wagged my finger accusingly at the boy in front of me, and a moment later his puppy-eyed expression twisted into a more familiar one, a crooked grin spreading across his face in a completely unashamed manner.

“Come on, _cupcake_ , you know you love it,” came a drawled response. I tried my best not to flinch at the nickname, pushing down thoughts of that night in the dark alley - it happened weeks ago, but I still couldn’t forget the feeling of rough hands and hard boots wrecking my body. And then there were the bruises, spreading like a disease across the body that I was already self-conscious about and defacing my pale skin for much longer that I had hoped for. I shook my head slightly in an attempt to shake the thoughts from my mind with it, and ignored the way that Karma was looking at me with concerned trepidation. A small smile tried to form on my lips, but it quickly faded as I looked back down at the script in my hands.

“Tch, whatever. Let’s just start.” My voice came out much smaller than I anticipated, and I winced slightly at my poor attempt of covering up my clear unhappiness. God, I sounded like such a wimp. Any other thoughts that were forming immediately halted as I felt a pair of strong arms wrap around my shoulders, gently tugging me into a warm hug. I thought about resisting, but I quickly gave up as I rested my head against Karma’s shoulder, encircling his waist with my own arms and fighting back those stupid tears that didn’t want to go away.

I felt the redhead tilt his head against my own, one of his hands trailing up my back to bury itself in my hair. His fingers barely skimmed the back of my shirt, but I still felt the heat of them as vividly as I would a spark of electricity, the gentle sensation leaving my skin tingling in its wake. I probably should have let go already, but the pull of Karma’s body heat was too comforting, too warm, too safe. And that was my problem: I was scared. Of those people in the alleyway, sure, but of other things too - most of which I didn’t even want to admit to myself, let alone admit out loud, because that would make it all too real.

After I had calmed down a bit, I lifted my head from Karma’s shoulder and looked up to meet his soft gaze, and I almost forgot to breathe for a minute at the sight before me. It was his eyes. It certainly wasn’t the first time I’d seen them, nor the first time I’d admired their unique colour, but it certainly _was_ the first time that I’d seen them from up this close - and my god, I don’t think I’d been enraptured by something as much as I was when I stared into those ignited amber orbs, completely transfixed.

I could only describe them as a blazing glow of untamed flames… but not violent or dangerous. More like a warm fireplace, gentle embers dancing across his irises in a plethora of vibrant colours. It was strange, it was only when you got close enough to him that you could even begin to pick out the different shades of fiery colours - from a distance, his eyes only looked to be a tawny shade of orange, but as soon as you looked closer, you could see just how wrong that initial assumption was. Vermillion, copper, chestnut, bronze, butterscotch, even golden flakes speckled around his magnified pupils, all framed in thick black lashes that that flicked as they shifted to look between my own eyes.

As soon as I detected that small movement, it was as if my mind had suddenly been pulled back to consciousness and I realised that I had been staring at Karma for god knows how long. I pulled out of his arms and proceeded to duck my head in an attempt to hide the flush that I could feel creeping up my cheeks, but that was all in vain as the older boy lifted my chin with a delicate finger to meet my eyes once again.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he prompted in a soft voice, clearly not trying to push the issue. I gave a weak but genuine smile in return, but shook my head and was grateful that Karma just left it at that.

Since neither of us were really in the mood to do any rehearsing after that, we rebuilt the pillow fort from earlier and simply lay around until it got darker, content to just listen to music and finish some homework. I honestly didn’t notice how late it was getting before I shifted my eyes to look out of the windows, only to see that the sky had turned into a beautiful mixture of colours that signified a sunset. Having recovered from my earlier meltdown, I nudged Karma and nodded my head towards the windows. It only took a few minutes to gather up our bags and move all the blankets back to the supply room - even though we were almost certain that no one else came here, it still felt wrong to leave the place in such a state.

“Ready?” I nodded in response to Karma’s question, before following him outside and closing the door behind me. We began walking in companionable silence, the quiet echo of our footsteps resonating throughout the woods the only sound keeping us company. There was this uneasy feeling fluttering about in my stomach as we trudged through the well-trodden path, but I had no idea what I was feeling so nervous about. I tried my best to just try and ignore it, but it only got worse and worse as we finally broke free of the trees and began walking down the streets.

I think Karma sensed my uneasiness, as he moved marginally closer so that our arms barely brushed against each other. Before I could send him a grateful smile, a familiar chorus of jeers sliced through the air and I stop dead in my tracks, fear spreading throughout my body like an icy chill. _Oh my god…_ I frantically wanted to move, run, hide, _anything_ , but my limbs refused to cooperate. My heart was thumping uncontrollably in my chest as I bored my gaze into the darkness ahead. _Please, don’t let them see me…_

I barely registered the redhead next to me trying to capture my attention. Just as I was about to turn my head, a cluster of figures swaggered out of the darkness, coming to a stop under a nearby street lamp. _Too late_ , I thought to myself. _It’s them_. By that time, Karma had moved in front of me and was desperately trying to meet my gaze. He quickly realised that I wasn’t paying any attention to him, and snapped his head around to try and see whatever it was that my focus was locked onto. Almost at the exact same time, a loud voice was directed towards us and the familiar group turned around. My heart stopped.

“Cupcake! Wow, I never thought we’d be seeing you again!” the gruff voice chortled, swiftly followed by an ensemble of boisterous cackles, making me unconsciously flinch.

Without a word, Karma placed a steady hand on the small of my back, and I was extremely grateful for the reassuring warmth.

“Hey sweetie, who’s your little boyfriend here?” the ringleader pressed, his brittle voice slicing through the air.

“Nagi, who are they?” Karma asked in a gentle voice, but my throat was too dry for me to voice any words. I turned my head slowly to look at the redhead beside me, the fear in my eyes taking him aback a little as our gazes clashed.

“Oh, maybe you don’t remember us?” the man continued. I would’ve scoffed were I not so utterly terrified - how the hell could I possibly forget what had happened?

“Well, allow me to jog your memory,” he continued. My heart skipped a beat as he reached into his pocket, half-expecting him to draw a knife or some other weapon; I knew I was being kinda paranoid, but what really frightened me was that it wasn’t completely illogical. What if they wanted to finish the job. 

A light jingling sound snapped me away from my thoughts. When my eyes rested upon what he was holding, the rest of the world seemed to dissolve away, the object in question being the only thing that I saw.

An all too familiar pendant dangled from his calloused fingers, the very image a complete oxymoron. I took in a sharp inhale as my mind was seized by a distant memory, one which I had shackled to the recesses of my unconsciousness in hopes that I would never have to relive it again.

-x-

My eyes were jolted awake by the sound of a smash and a distant shout, my sleep-addled brain not quite registering what was going on. After glancing out of my curtains and seeing that it was still dark, I decided that it was too early to get up. I was just about to drift back to sleep again, before another jumble of harsh sounds pierced through the silence of my bedroom. Before I had time to process anything, I threw back the covers of my dinosaur-covered duvet and quickly crossed the room to pull open the door. Tiptoeing towards the staircase, I strained my ears trying to hear what the hushed voices were arguing about downstairs, but I couldn’t quite make out the words.

Still curious about what anyone could be doing up so late, I clutched the banister tightly and slowly descended the stairs, being careful not to trip or lose my footing. Eventually I got to the bottom, and wandered through the short hallway to get to the kitchen, where I thought source of the noise was. As I got closer, the hushed words were clear enough to make out. Even so, my young mind couldn’t really understand the harsh words being exchanged; all I knew was that my parents weren’t in bed, and they seemed to be upset. So of course, the only thing I thought about was making them happy again.

Toddling into the kitchen, I recoiled slightly at the bright lights that contrasted sharply with the rest of the dark house. The first thing I saw upon entering the room was my mum sitting down at the kitchen table, her hand carding roughly through her already tousled hair. I smiled brightly, clearly not sensing the strained atmosphere that left the air thick with unresolved tension. Before I could open my mouth to call out to her, my father paced into my peripheral vision and I tilted my head to see what he was doing here too. Dad had a stony expression, his lips pulled into a tight line and his eyes flashing in a mixture of indiscernible emotions; looking back, it was probably a mixture of disgust, indignation, distress, and something similar to (but not quite) remorse. Ever since that day, I refused to think of that man as much as I could, and remorse was clearly not something that he was capable of. Not after what he did.

“Daddy…?” I called, my tired voice barely carrying across the large space of the room. Despite my muted voice, both my parents’ heads whipped around so fast I was shocked that they weren’t dizzy. I met their wide eyes with my own confused ones, silently questioning what they were doing. Nobody said anything for a minute, the silence palpable even to my 4-year-old self. My mum as the first to speak.

“Nagisa, what are you doing out of bed?” her sharp voice demanded, making me instinctively flinch. That tone had been used on me so many times, and it was usually followed by something nasty. I knew by then that I was in serious trouble, and I had to try my hardest not to let any tears form - weakness was something that wasn’t tolerated in this house.

“Oh now look what you’ve done,” my dad interjected, “you’re nearly making him cry! What is wrong with you?”

Mum simply scoffed in response, rolling her eyes haughtily in a way that was clearly supposed to be condescending. “Tch, what’s wrong with _me_? It’s not my fault he can’t stay in bed. If only he were a girl, I’m certain he would be much more well-behaved.”

“See, _this_ is why we argue! Nagisa’s clearly not a girl, he doesn’t _want_ to be a girl, I don’t understand why you can’t get it through your thick skull that we have a _son_ and he should be treated at such!” my dad retorted, his voice slowly growing in volume.

“For God’s sake, stop being so _dramatic_ !” Mum shot right back, “Since you _clearly_ can’t stand being around me so much, why bother staying? Why don’t you just pack your bags and leave us both alone!” By the time she had finished speaking, Mum had risen out of her chair and slowly sauntered forward to stand right in front of the man she was arguing with.

Dad only glared in return, the two of them standing completely still for a moment. Without any warning, Dad took a step back and brought a hand up to wiggle his wedding ring off his finger. My eyes glistened with unshed tears as he threw it down to the floor, watching it slowly roll towards me.

“Fine. I’m tired of pretending. I’m tired of wearing this ring and pretending that it means anything anymore, I’m tired of pretending that _you_ still feel _anything_ for me anymore. I’ve been living in a world of delusion, a seemingly-constant lie that we’ve spent years fabricating for ourselves. I loved you once, Hiromi, but you’ve changed; we’ve both changed. And I’ll be damned if I let it continue any longer.”

Most of the words that he said were lost to me, but I felt the weight of their meaning even though they weren’t directed at me. I kept staring at Dad as he turned towards me, still speechless when he crouched down at eye-level to look pointedly into my watering eyes, offering a small smile as he picked up the fallen ring.

“Hey Nagisa. Daddy’s going to be going away for a while, okay? But don’t worry, I won’t be gone for long - you’ll see me really soon, I’ll make sure of it.” I felt my bottom lip quivering as the tears finally spilled over my lids and left damp streaks staining my cheeks. He was leaving me. And for some reason, I didn’t believe a word he said. Dad lifted a finger to softly brush away my tears, but they were falling too fast and too heavy. A flash of pain flickered through his eyes as he carefully prepared his next words.

“Hey, don’t cry buddy. I promise Daddy will come and see you soon. Now, I want you to take care of this for me, okay? As an extra promise that I’ll come back.” He pushed the cool metal into my tiny palm, pressing my fingers to curl around the smooth ring that I had always seen wrapped around his own finger.

“I love you so much. Never forget that,” he whispered, pressing a gentle lingering kiss to my forehead before standing back up and resolutely striding out of the door that I had come through just minutes before.

Another metallic sound hit hard tiled floor, ringing sharply in the deafening silence. Another flash of gold rolled towards me, accompanied by the soft pad of feet as my mum walked wordlessly out of the room. With slightly shaking hands, I picked up the identical ring that had just dropped to the ground, staring numbly at the matching bands in my small palm. And in that moment, I realised what had just happened. Within the span of mere minutes, my life had turned completely upside down.

He never did come back.

-x-

Back in the present, I found myself staring at those same two rings; only now, they were hanging off a simple gold chain that Kayano had once given me for this exact purpose. The rings were clearly too big for my fingers, so I thought that putting them on a necklace was the next best thing in order to keep them close to me. Despite the anger that I should’ve be feeling, I found myself feeling disgusted. Disgusted at myself for not realising earlier that they were missing. I’d been wearing that pendant for over a decade now, how could I let myself lose it so easily and then _not even realise_ that they’d been taken. 

I unconsciously clenched my fists, my nails digging into my skin harshly and probably leaving little moon-shaped imprints. Soft fingers gently encased my vice-like grip, and I glanced at Karma quickly before relaxing my hands and tentatively wrapping my fingers around Karma’s in an attempt to gain some sort of comfort. The gang leader’s eyes followed the movement, and sneered when he saw what we were doing.

“Aw, how sweet!” he mocked, “The little lovebirds are trying to give each other strength! Ah, but don’t worry: I’m not actually the bad guy you think I am!” I almost rolled my eyes at that, feeling a little braver at having the physical contact with Karma.

“You can totally have these back… for a small price.” He gave a toothy grin, and I unthinkingly squeezed Karma’s hand tighter at the ominous sight.

“Whatever it is you want,” Karma drawled, “you can shove it right up your arse. Nagisa’s not doing anything for you.” My heart lurched at that, both grateful that he was standing up for me and mildly horrified that he would just let them keep something so precious to me.

“Well, it’s a good thing that what we want doesn’t have to come from him then, isn’t it?” came the sickly sweet response, taking us both aback. I gave Karma a warning look, but he refused to meet my eyes.

“Name your price.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> So, it would be great if you could let me know what Karma could give the thugs (I actually have no clue, I'm totally making this up as I go)!  
> As usual, I'm always so grateful for all your kudos, comments and bookmarks - they really mean a lot to me. Anyways, let me know what you think and I'll hopefully see you again soon! x


	14. Sleepovers and Ballrooms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahh I really wanted this up for Nagisa's birthday but I started writing too late so I couldn't finish it in time -.-  
> Oh well, I really hope you like this fluffy chapter - it's not perfect, but I actually had a lot of fun writing it!

A sinister grin spread across the thug's face, and my heart nearly stopped as Karma’s words reverberated in my ears. What the hell was he thinking? My eyes snapped across to look at the  redhead’s face, trying to make any sense about what he just said. His stoic expression held strong, not a flicker of emotion breaking his serious facade as he continued to stare down the man across the street. I noticed that he looked slightly taken aback, but I was far too focused on the boy in front of me to pay him much attention; it was quite ironic really, I had been so fixated on these people from the alleyway for months, and all it took was one bold comment from my best friend to forget about them, even if it was just temporary.

“Karma,” I whispered under my breath, cautiously touching his elbow to try and get his attention again. The boy in question tilted his head slightly and met my gaze for a brief moment, before flashing a dazzling grin in my direction.  _ Damn, why hadn’t I realised he had dimples… _ That was enough to complete disarm me once again, and I couldn’t help the tinge of red that stained my cheeks as I kept staring like an absolute idiot. I had no idea why I was having such a reaction to a  _ smile _ , but there was just something about the way it completely illuminated his face, the way his eyes flashed like fire as our gazes clashed. The dull thud of my heart pounding in my chest sounded almost deafening in the silence around us. 

And in that moment, it was as if someone had flicked an invisible switch somewhere inside me. For years to come, I would look back with fondness at this moment, the edges of that memory tinted rose with a certain wisdom that only time would allow. I had no idea how much this one moment would impact the rest of my life… But back then, I was completely clueless. 

Time seemed to suddenly start again as I tore my gaze away from the taller boy, just in time to see my attackers start to compose themselves. The leader took another step forward in a rather pathetic attempt of intimidation - it clearly didn’t work as Karma stood his ground, standing with even more resolution. After a minute of complete inaction, the thug clicked his tongue in an expression of nonchalance and began speaking again.

“Tch, whatever brat.” And with those eloquent words, he turned his back and began walking away, chucking my necklace over his back as he sauntered away. Without thinking, I dashed over the short distance to where the golden chain was sprawled on the damp streets, before picking it up and staring blankly at the rings lying in my palm. A warm hand came to rest on my shoulder, but I didn’t have to look to know who it was.

“Hey Nagi, how about you stay at mine tonight?” the soothing voice asked, and I nodded along without really thinking about it. Luckily it didn’t take too long to get to Karma’s house, and we walked in comfortable silence the whole way.

By the time we arrived at his house, the moonlight was bright enough to bathe the streets in a silvery glow, perfectly reflecting the quiet tranquility around us as Karma unlocked the front door and stepped in. It came as no surprise that the house was empty. Of the numerous times that I had been here, I had never seen Karma’s parents; apparently they were always out of town going travelling or something, but that was a subject that we never really talked about. 

After ascending the winding stairs to the redhead’s bedroom, we went through the familiar routine of pulling out an extra mattress as well as all of the bedding. It didn’t take too long, and before I knew it we were tucked into our respective beds and Karma was reaching to switch his bedside lamp off. For some reason his hand hesitated, before he retracted it completely and turned on his side to face me properly. I raised an eyebrow in question, trying to maintain a neutral expression and  _ not _ focus on the way the dim light caught the edges of his face and accented those strong cheekbones.

“So,” he began, “what should we talk about?” I felt my face twist in confusion - what was he on about?

“I thought we were just going to sleep…?” I whispered in return, watching as a slow smile stretched across the other boy’s lips.

“Nah, this is a sleepover! Let’s have some fun,”  he drawled, his impish tone punctuated by a cheeky wink. Refusing to think about the connotations that Karma was clearly trying to imply (jokingly, of course), I sat up and let the several blankets fall to pool around my hips.

“What do you have in mind?” I asked, tilting my head slightly in a gesture of amiability. My eyes wandered slightly as Karma visibly swallowed, his throat constricting as his adam’s apple dipped with the movement. He coughed slightly before throwing back his bedsheets with a flourish and moving swiftly across the room to rummage through a pile of random stuff covering his desk. After letting out a small noise of what I assumed to be triumph, he turned around with a huge grin plastered across his face and a small box-shaped thing resting in his hand. I almost had to  double-take as I recognised the object to be nothing other than the exact same polaroid that the redhead used on our art trip all those weeks ago.

“I’ve been wanting to try this thing out again, I haven’t really had the chance to use it all that much,” he explained, already answering my silent question. He briefly messed around with a few buttons, before coming to perch on the end of my mattress.

“What do you want to take photos of?” I inquired, curious as to why he suddenly wanted to get his camera out. Karma glanced up to give me an incredulous look, as if the answer was obvious. I shuffled around uncomfortably under his scrutinising gaze, suddenly feeling self-conscious.

“... Seriously? Us, of course!” he answered, moving a few pillows around to come and sit next to me. I cast my eyes downwards to look at what I was wearing and my face immediately began to flush pink. Since I had come here in the spur of the moment, I obviously didn’t have any other clothes to change into, so Karma had given me one of his faded grey t-shirts (which just so happened to look massive on me), and I just stayed in my boxers as I assumed that no-one would see me.

“That’s great and all, but I look kinda ridiculous in my bedtime couture,” I chuckled, not entirely convinced by Karma’s ‘fun’ plan.

“I think you look cute,” he shrugged, his serious tone completely throwing me off. I diverted my eyes once again, allowing a small smile to tug at my lips as my face flushed even deeper.

Thankfully I got a hold of my red-faced situation and was back to relative normality by the time the other boy had sorted the camera out.

“So… do you want to pose or…?” I stammered awkwardly, clearly completely clueless as to how to treat the situation - after all, it’s not like I often participate in spontaneous photo shoots. Karma gave me a side-eyed smile, which was the only warning I had before a bright light flashed into my eyes and the tell-tale sound of a camera going off filled my ears. I blinked rapidly to try and dispel the black spots that were covering my vision, and was about to shout at Karma for endangering my poor eyes, when I was cut off by the sound of muffled giggles.

The redhead was hunched over himself, his shoulders shaking with every inhalation of breath as he snickered at his little stunt. My lips twitched upwards as I snatched the developing photo from Karma’s hands in faux-irritation, trying my best not to give in to the contagious laughter.

As I focused my eyes onto the polaroid in my fingers, my reddening face gradually came into view as the blackness of the photograph dissolved. It was hard to take myself seriously anymore, as the version of myself in that photo looked so ridiculous; my eyes were diverted away from the camera and I was nervously biting my lip, causing it to flush even deeper than my face. I couldn’t help the smile that spread across my face as I looked closer at the picture in amusement - from the way my oversized t-shirt was dangling off my shoulders, to the way the hair in my usually-neat pigtails was sticking out at odd angles, the whole image was just absurd.

“I take it you approve of my spectacular photography skills then?” Karma teased, and I simply grinned and landed a playful punch on his arm in response.

Before I could formulate my next plan of action, the redhead scooted even closer so that our sides were practically flush together. He lifted the camera at an angle above us, placing his other arm somewhere behind me so that (I assume) we could both get into the shot. A gentle smile was mirrored on both of our faces, perfectly captured by the clicking of the shutter and the muffled whirring of the polaroid coming out.

We spent an indefinite amount of time wasting countless reels of film and competing to see who could pull the silliest face, all punctuated by uncontrollable giggles and the flashes of a camera. 

“Hey, are you sure you don’t mind using all of this film up?” I asked, still a bit breathless from all the laughter we had just endured. Karma just waved his hand in dismissal.

“Nah, it's totally fine. Besides, what else would I use it for?” I shrugged in vague agreement; it was kinda hard to disagree when we’d just had the absolute time of our lives messing around and being silly, without a moment to spare a thought about the outside world. Glancing at the clock on Karma’s desk, I realised that it was way later than I’d anticipated.

“It’s getting pretty late, we should probably go to sleep,” I announced, leaning into the redhead’s side to try and get him to move back to his own bed, but that only succeeded in moving even closer to the taller boy. Not that I minded, but now my side was getting all nice and warm… 

Trying to avoid that train of thought, I turned my head to restate my thoughts but was caught off-guard as the full force of Karma’s puppy dog eyes hit me like a freight train (or ten). I swallowed uncomfortably, only just having noticed how close we were actually sitting. 

“Uh… I guess we can take one more picture if you want…” I trailed off pathetically, watching out the corner of my eye as Karma’s face lit up and he nodded enthusiastically. Once again, he raised his arm to get as much of us in the picture as possible. A sneaky arm wrapped around my waist as I settled against the other boy, leaning my head against his own as I waited for the final photo to be taken.

“Say cheese, Nagi.” As my lips pulled into an easy smile, I felt a warm pressure press against my jaw. Time seemed to slow as the shutter clicked and a bright flash illuminated our faces. The moment had ended almost as quickly as it had begun, and before I could process anything else Karma had stood up and was already climbing back into bed. Deciding not to question it, I flopped down onto my own mattress and turned over to face the other boy’s bed. 

“Night, Karma,” I yawned, burying myself comfortably in a nest of blankets. The redhead simply returned a tender smile, before he switched off his lamp and the clutches of sleep took us both.

-x-

The next few weeks were bland, sometimes even bordering on tedious. Every morning I woke up, made sure my necklace was securely attached, ate breakfast, got dressed, went to school. Obviously I did things in between (I’m not a dirty savage), but my point is that every day seemed to drag into the next, and I couldn’t wait for summer to finally come; unfortunately, we still had a few months left to go, and with the end of the year slowly coming up, tension in the school was rising.

I had no idea whether it was the warmer weather or what, but people seemed to be getting particularly angsty recently. Can’t really blame them though, this time of year was usually the busiest period of the whole school year and it happened right when people didn’t want it. Exams were at the forefront of most people’s minds, but our class had the extra strain of the damn school play - most of us were barely keeping it together, but I was absolutely freaking out at this point, what with being oh, I don’t know,  _ one of the main fucking characters!  _ To be fair though, Korosensei was an actual blessing through it all. He often let Karma and I go and practise wherever we wanted, obviously understanding that there was only so much room in the drama studio for everyone rehearsing. 

It didn’t help one bit that I was still absolutely petrified of going on stage. Over half a year since getting this role, and I still couldn’t practise in front of anyone other than Karma, and that was only because we had so many scenes together that we learn to act comfortably around each other. My other friends kept insisting that being on stage would be different, and that the overhead lights would be so bright that I wouldn’t be able to see the audience anyway - but that wasn’t the point!  _Ugh_ , I thought to myself,  _ this is going to be an absolute  _ **_disaster_ ** _! _

A poke on my cheek pulled me out of my anxiety-driven daydream, and I turned my head to see Karma’s worried expression trying to silently communicate with me.

“I’m fine,” I assured, though we both knew that I was completely lying. I was thankful that he didn’t comment on it though, and I tried to pull myself back together to focus on the script in front of me. 

I took a couple of steps back to reset where I was supposed to be standing for this scene, before breathing deeply to try and prepare as best as I could for this rehearsal; after all, I often felt guilty that I was always the one to mess up our scenes, and I really wanted to nail this one without the script. 

“Okay, Theo,” I began, pacing slowly across the empty classroom that Karma and I had found - like I said earlier, Korosensei usually let us out of his classes if we needed a bigger space like we did today. My eyes darted analytically around the room, and I felt myself slip into the all-too familiar role of the assassin Ash.

“Have you got eyes on the target?” I murmured, deliberately not making eye-contact with Karma as we were supposed to be undercover. I could almost picture it now: a ballroom full of prestigious, wealthy people, our target nowhere to be seen and just the two of us agents milling about in a casual facade to find and eliminate him. 

“Negative. Slippery bastard…” Karma replied, his voice barely audible even in the silent room. As my eyes swept the room once more, they landed upon what I had been looking: Lord Berkeley himself. In reality it was just a mop we’d placed in the corner earlier, but we had to use our imagination when the other actor wasn’t there; it was supposed to have been Terasaka, but he wasn’t in school so we’d had to improvise. 

I tried to look as natural as possible as I slowed to a complete halt, my eyes never once leaving the mop as if my life depended on it. 

“I have eyes on Berkeley. I’m moving in.” As I began to advance towards the mop, Karma intercepted me and grabbed my arm firmly, smoothly guiding me away from the target. I gave him a dangerous look and tried to subtly get my arm out of his grip, but I couldn’t really do anything as that would attract more attention.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I muttered under my breath, impressively not losing my footing as the taller boy suddenly spun me around to join what  _ would _ be the other people waltzing on the ballroom floor. 

“Dancing, what do think I’m doing?” he replied, one hand gripping my own steadily with the other balanced on my hip. I resentfully placed my free hand on Karma’s shoulder, who took that as an indication to begin the slow twirls of a ballroom dance. 

“I’m serious,” I hissed in annoyance, “do you know how much trouble you could be in for doing this?” I deliberately tried to step on his toes to convey my frustration even further, but he dodged me gracefully, not falling even a step out of time with the music. Karma looked down at me with narrowed eyebrows, and simply gave a small huff of disapproval at my childish behaviour.

“He’s not alone. Look again, and this time  _ look properly _ .”

Before we could get any further, there was a brief knock on the classroom door which quickly opened, revealing a rather tired-looking Sugino. He immediately perked up after seeing what scene Karma and I had reached; I rolled my eyes at his reaction, but didn’t move as I spoke.

“Where have you been?” I asked, concerned as to why he was so late to the lesson. He let out a brief laugh, scratching the back of his neck awkwardly.

“Sorry, I totally woke up late. But I’m here now!” he announced proudly.

“Don’t worry about it, you’re actually just in time,” I replied. “We were about to need you for the ballroom scene.” Sugino simply gave a salute, before moving to stand next to our friend the mop.  _ Honestly, it was more reliable than Terasaka… maybe we should name it? _ My odd train of thought was cut off by Karma giving my hand a gentle squeeze, indicating that we were about to resume our rehearsal.  _ Ah well. I’ll just file that thought away for another day. At least it’ll make Karma laugh _ . And with that thought, a small smile wormed its way onto my face, and I began the slow ballroom steps that we’d been practising before.

My eyes once again flickered to the corner that was now occupied with two people, clicking my tongue as I recognised the other figure.

“Dammit. The Turkish ambassador, right?” Karma nodded in confirmation.

“Ambassador Bilgiç if I’m not mistaken.” I tilted my head upwards to try and meet Karma’s gaze - something wasn’t right, and needed to know whether he sensed it too. I was about to open my mouth, when the ambassador himself wandered over to where we were dancing with an overly-friendly smile that immediately threw up several red flags. Sugino directed the full force of his beaming expression towards Karma, who visibly stalled upon being seen.

“Well hello there gentlemen! Do you mind awfully if I take your lovely partner for a dance?” Sugino’s eyes were suddenly drilling into my own and he flashed me a rather unwelcome wink, before turning to the taller boy once again and looking expectant. Karma hesitated for just a moment too long, before returning a cordial smile and letting go of me completely.

“Of course not, sir.” He replied with a slight bow of politeness, but locked eyes with me the whole time. We had a whole silent conversation through the minute movement of our eyes, before the redhead gave me a genuine smile and began to walk away towards the mop in the corner, presumably having to complete the mission himself. 

Sugino quickly moved in to replace Karma’s spot, and grasped my hands a fraction too tightly before the deceptive grin was back on his face.

“So,” he whispered, leaning in and invading my personal space. “Tell me all about yourself.” 

I let go almost too quickly when the scene was finally over, letting out a deep sigh that we finally got through it without too many hiccups. Karma flashed a grin in my direction, before wandering over and leaning against the wall beside me.

“Well done, Nagi,” his velvety voice congratulated. “Looks like we’ll make a great actor of you yet.”

I couldn’t hold back the grin that spread across my lips, though I ignored the thumping of my heart as Karma nudged my arm playfully.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading and, as always, I'd love to hear what you think about it.
> 
> Also, sorry to the real Lord Berkeley and Ambassador Bilgiç - they're actually real people who do things (I have no idea what) for the UK, so I mean no disrespect to them!
> 
> On another note, I'm finally starting to actually enjoy writing again, so hopefully the story will get better from here!  
> See you all soon! x

**Author's Note:**

> Talk to me on [tumblr](http://moonwisher3.tumblr.com/)!


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